Back to search
Higgs et al., 2014

The morphological diversity of Osedax worm borings (Annelida: Siboglinidae)

Higgs, N. D., Glover, A. G., Dahlgren, T. G., Smith, C. R., Fujiwara, Y., Pradillon, F., Johnson, S. B., Vrijenhoek, R. C., Little, C. T.
DOI
DOI10.1017/S0025315414000770
Year2014
JournalJournal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom
Volume94
Number7
Pages1429-1439
Typearticle in journal
LanguageEnglish
Id51611

Abstract

Marine worms in the genus Osedax, have specialized 'root' tissues used to bore into the bones of decomposing vertebrate skeletons and obtain nutrition. We investigated the borings of nine Osedax species, using micro computed tomography to quantitatively describe the morphology of the borings and provide three-dimensional reconstructions of the space occupied by Osedax root tissues inside the bone. Each Osedax species displayed a consistent boring morphology in any given bone, but these differed between bones. In bones where multiple species coexisted there was limited evidence for spatial niche partitioning by Osedax root tissues inside the bones investigated here. The new morphological data may be applied to Osedax traces in fossil bones, showing that borings can be used to indicate minimum species richness in these bone

Last change: 27.6.2025
KIKNATARCSARVTÜ Loodusmuuseumi geokogudEesti Loodusmuuseumi geoloogia osakond
All materials in the portal are for free usage according to CC BY-SA , unless indiated otherwise.
Portal is part of natianal research infrastructure and geoscience data platform SARV, hosted by TalTech.
Open Book icon by Icons8.