The Smithsonian’s National Zoo has become the first in the zoo and aquarium community to use coral larvae settling techniques to successfully grow two species of anemones—an accomplishment that will provide the Zoo a unique opportunity to learn how anemones grow.
“We have many questions about how to care for these animals as they grow from larvae to adults,” said Mike Henley, an animal keeper at the Zoo’s Invertebrate Exhibit who applied the technique to the anemones after they had spawned. “The oceans are not an infinite resource and so anything that we can learn about the captive management of coral and anemones will go far in our ability to conserve them.”
The anemones—both of which are commonly called Tealia red anemones under the species of Urticina—spawned in late April and early May, just days apart. Hours after they spawned, Henley collected the eggs and sperm from the more than 2,000-gallon tank and put them together in smaller tanks to increase the chances of fertilization. After fertilization, the larvae settled and metamorphosed into a polyp. Henley put some of the developing larvae in a circular tank—called a kreisel—that automatically stirs the water to prevent the larvae from binding to one another, which would kill the animals. The kreisel is the same tank Henley and others use in the field in Puerto Rico to hold coral larvae. Other free-swimming larvae went into a regular tank with aeration and rocks to settle on. Now the Zoo has hundreds of thriving anemones behind the scenes, all smaller than the tip of a pencil.
“Sometimes we take the lessons we learn with animals in captivity and apply that to conserving them in the wild,” said Alan Peters, curator of the Zoo’s Invertebrate Exhibit. “But here we were able to apply what we’ve learned both in the field and from ex situ work and it is yielding some exciting results.”
While anemones and coral are both in the Anthozoa class of animals, they differ in a few notable ways. Anemones metamorphose into a single polyp, while coral will divide into a second polyp and a third and so on, to form a colony. In addition, anemones have a muscular foot they use to attach to rock, while stony corals make their own calcium carbonate rock that they live on. But both can sting and are carnivorous, feeding on crabs, shrimp, fish and zooplankton. More than 1,000 sea anemone species inhabit the world’s oceans at various depths, from the sandy seashore up to the surface. Visitors to the Zoo can see six different species of anemones, including cold and warm water anemones. Although anemones are not endangered, ocean habitats around the world are in decline as the result of pollution, runoff and sedimentation, climate change, acidification and poor fishing practices.
Henley will continue to observe the anemones to learn about their growth rate and the conditions that are necessary to rear these species in captivity, including the food, light and water temperature they require.
“In the past if the anemones spawned in the tank, it’d be a big headache,” said Henley. “You’d have to do frequent water changes because when the gametes—or reproductive cells—get too concentrated and deteriorate, it causes the water quality to crash. That’s the common experience among many of our zoo and aquarium colleagues. But this was different—so far it’s amounted to young anemones that we will continue to learn from for months, even years, to come.”
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Showing posts with label smithsonian. Show all posts
Showing posts with label smithsonian. Show all posts
Friday, August 27, 2010
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
World’s Largest Snake Discovered in Fossilized Rainforest
Sixty million years before Jennifer Lopez starred in the film “Anaconda,” the world’s biggest snake slithered around northern South America. Excavations in Colombia co-organized by Carlos Jaramillo, staff scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama and Jonathan Bloch, curator of vertebrate paleontology at the University of Florida’s Florida Museum of Natural History, unearthed fossil remains of a new snake species named Titanoboa cerrejonensis.
Surrounded by huge trucks extracting coal from Cerrejon, one of the world’s largest open-pit mines, researchers discovered fossilized bones of super-sized snakes and their prey, crocodiles and turtles, in the Cerrejon Formation, along with fossilized plant material from the oldest known rainforest in the Americas, which flourished at the site 58-60 million years ago.
Jason Head, the lead author of the new species description in the journal Nature, is a research associate at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Toronto Mississauga. Head, with David Polly, associate professor of geosciences at Indiana University, used the ratio between vertebral size and the length of existing snakes to estimate that this boa-like snake must have reached 13 meters (42 feet) in length and weighed more than a ton. Titanoboa, as it is now called, is the largest snake ever known, and was the largest non-marine vertebrate from the epoch immediately following the extinction of dinosaurs 65 million years ago. “The discovery of Titanoboa challenges our understanding of past climates and environments, as well as the biological limitations on the evolution of giant snakes.” said Head “This shows how much more information about the history of Earth there is to glean from a resource like the reptile fossil record.”
Titanoboa’s size indicates that it lived in an environment where the average yearly temperature was 30-34 degrees Celsius. This estimate coincides with paleoclimatic models predicting greenhouse conditions. “This temperature estimate is much hotter than modern temperatures in tropical rainforests anywhere in the world. The fossil floras that the Smithsonian has been collecting in Cerrejon for many years indicate that the area was a tropical rainforest. That means that tropical rainforests could exist at temperatures 3-4 degrees Celsius hotter than modern tropical rainforests experience,” said Jaramillo.
Support for this research comes from the National Science Foundation, Fondo para Investigaciones del Banco de la Republica de Colombia, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute Paleobiology Fund, the Florida Museum of Natural History, a Geological Society of America Graduate Student Research Grant and a National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Discovery Grant and the Cerrejon Coal Mine.
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Surrounded by huge trucks extracting coal from Cerrejon, one of the world’s largest open-pit mines, researchers discovered fossilized bones of super-sized snakes and their prey, crocodiles and turtles, in the Cerrejon Formation, along with fossilized plant material from the oldest known rainforest in the Americas, which flourished at the site 58-60 million years ago.
Jason Head, the lead author of the new species description in the journal Nature, is a research associate at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and assistant professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of Toronto Mississauga. Head, with David Polly, associate professor of geosciences at Indiana University, used the ratio between vertebral size and the length of existing snakes to estimate that this boa-like snake must have reached 13 meters (42 feet) in length and weighed more than a ton. Titanoboa, as it is now called, is the largest snake ever known, and was the largest non-marine vertebrate from the epoch immediately following the extinction of dinosaurs 65 million years ago. “The discovery of Titanoboa challenges our understanding of past climates and environments, as well as the biological limitations on the evolution of giant snakes.” said Head “This shows how much more information about the history of Earth there is to glean from a resource like the reptile fossil record.”
Titanoboa’s size indicates that it lived in an environment where the average yearly temperature was 30-34 degrees Celsius. This estimate coincides with paleoclimatic models predicting greenhouse conditions. “This temperature estimate is much hotter than modern temperatures in tropical rainforests anywhere in the world. The fossil floras that the Smithsonian has been collecting in Cerrejon for many years indicate that the area was a tropical rainforest. That means that tropical rainforests could exist at temperatures 3-4 degrees Celsius hotter than modern tropical rainforests experience,” said Jaramillo.
Support for this research comes from the National Science Foundation, Fondo para Investigaciones del Banco de la Republica de Colombia, Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute Paleobiology Fund, the Florida Museum of Natural History, a Geological Society of America Graduate Student Research Grant and a National Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada Discovery Grant and the Cerrejon Coal Mine.
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Friday, January 30, 2009
Smithsonian Scientist Helps to Solve a Deep-Sea Mystery
For decades scientists have known about three different fishes called tapetails, bignose fishes and whalefishes. A team of scientists, including Smithsonian ichthyologist Dave Johnson, however, have recently discovered that they are actually all part of the same family. The team’s findings were published in the journal Biology Letters by the Royal Society in London last week.
The mid-depths of the ocean between sunlit surface waters and the bottom, known as the bathypelagic realm (1,000-4,000 meters), constitute the largest yet most poorly studied ecological area on Earth. Recently captured deep-sea fishes and older museum specimens have enabled scientists to solve a decades-old puzzle, uniting three previously recognized families as one. Johnson and the team studied the DNA and the very different body structures of the tapetails (Mirapinnidae), bignose fish (Megalomycteridae) and whalefish (Cetomimidae) and found that the three are actually the larvae, males and females, respectively, of a single family: Cetomimidae. The scientists have documented a remarkable combination of developmental transformations and sexual dimorphism (the difference in appearance between males and females) that is unparalleled among vertebrates. The solution involved detailed analyses of changes in the anatomy of specimens in transition from larvae to females and larvae to males and DNA analyses of all three life stages.
“This is an incredibly significant and exciting finding,” said Johnson, from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History. “For decades scientists have wondered why all tapetails were sexually immature, all bignose fishes were males and all whalefishes were females and had no known larval stages. The answer to part of that question was right under our noses all along—the specimens of tapetails and bignose fishes that were used to describe their original families included transitional forms—we just needed to study them more carefully.”
A molecular clue and fresh specimens spurred Johnson and co-author John Paxton, of the Australian Museum, to look more closely, and then came the fortuitous capture of a transitional female in 2007 by co-author Tracey Sutton of the Virginia Institute of Marine Science. With that, the Japanese team, led by Masaki Miya of Chiba University’s Natural History Museum and Institute, analyzed DNA from additional specimens, and it all fell into place. “This is the sort of puzzle solving that a scientist dreams about!”
Morphological transformations of whalefishes involve dramatic changes in the skeleton, most spectacularly in the head, and are correlated with distinctly different feeding mechanisms. Larvae have small, upturned mouths and gorge on small crustaceans called copepods. Females have huge gapes with long, horizontal jaws and specialized gill arches allowing them to capture larger prey. Males, on the other hand, lose their stomach and esophagus after transformation and so, do not eat; they rely instead on a huge liver to support their search for females. Whalefishes, which are not whale-like in size (females grow up to 16 inches and mature males are no larger than 2.5 inches) are named for the shape of their body. The approximately 20 known species of whalefishes are found throughout the world’s open oceans.
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The mid-depths of the ocean between sunlit surface waters and the bottom, known as the bathypelagic realm (1,000-4,000 meters), constitute the largest yet most poorly studied ecological area on Earth. Recently captured deep-sea fishes and older museum specimens have enabled scientists to solve a decades-old puzzle, uniting three previously recognized families as one. Johnson and the team studied the DNA and the very different body structures of the tapetails (Mirapinnidae), bignose fish (Megalomycteridae) and whalefish (Cetomimidae) and found that the three are actually the larvae, males and females, respectively, of a single family: Cetomimidae. The scientists have documented a remarkable combination of developmental transformations and sexual dimorphism (the difference in appearance between males and females) that is unparalleled among vertebrates. The solution involved detailed analyses of changes in the anatomy of specimens in transition from larvae to females and larvae to males and DNA analyses of all three life stages.
“This is an incredibly significant and exciting finding,” said Johnson, from the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History. “For decades scientists have wondered why all tapetails were sexually immature, all bignose fishes were males and all whalefishes were females and had no known larval stages. The answer to part of that question was right under our noses all along—the specimens of tapetails and bignose fishes that were used to describe their original families included transitional forms—we just needed to study them more carefully.”
A molecular clue and fresh specimens spurred Johnson and co-author John Paxton, of the Australian Museum, to look more closely, and then came the fortuitous capture of a transitional female in 2007 by co-author Tracey Sutton of the Virginia Institute of Marine Science. With that, the Japanese team, led by Masaki Miya of Chiba University’s Natural History Museum and Institute, analyzed DNA from additional specimens, and it all fell into place. “This is the sort of puzzle solving that a scientist dreams about!”
Morphological transformations of whalefishes involve dramatic changes in the skeleton, most spectacularly in the head, and are correlated with distinctly different feeding mechanisms. Larvae have small, upturned mouths and gorge on small crustaceans called copepods. Females have huge gapes with long, horizontal jaws and specialized gill arches allowing them to capture larger prey. Males, on the other hand, lose their stomach and esophagus after transformation and so, do not eat; they rely instead on a huge liver to support their search for females. Whalefishes, which are not whale-like in size (females grow up to 16 inches and mature males are no larger than 2.5 inches) are named for the shape of their body. The approximately 20 known species of whalefishes are found throughout the world’s open oceans.
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Tuesday, January 13, 2009
National Zoo Has a New Baby Gorilla
A baby western lowland gorilla was born January 11 at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo. Staff estimate the baby was born at approximately 1:45 p.m. to 26-year-old female Mandara and 16-year-old Baraka. The newborn represents the seventh successful gorilla birth for the Zoo since 1991. This is the sixth offspring for Mandara. The newborn joins siblings Kigali, Kwame and Kojo, as well as group member Haloko at the Great Ape House. All of the Zoo’s gorillas will remain on exhibit.
Both mother and baby appear to be doing well. The baby’s sex has not yet been determined.
“We began monitoring the baby as soon as it was discovered and will continue to do so for the next couple of weeks,” said Don Moore, associate director for animal care. “This is a very critical time for the survival of the infant, and all precautions must be taken to ensure that Mandara and her baby are in an environment that is comfortable, safe and controlled. Mandara is a very experienced and competent mother, and we’re confident that she will properly care for and bond with her baby.”
The gorilla birth is significant for the National Zoo. Western lowland gorillas, which are native to tropical forests of West and Central Africa, are listed as critically endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources Red List of Threatened Species, primarily due to habitat loss and fragmentation and poaching. They are also a focus of the Zoo’s participation in Species Survival Plan, in which North American zoos collaborate to encourage the development of a self-sustaining zoo gorilla population, helping to ensure the survival of this endangered species. Each SSP manages the breeding of a species in order to maintain a healthy and self-sustaining population that is both genetically diverse and demographically stable.
Mandara, born at the Lincoln Park Zoo in April 1982, is owned by the Milwaukee Zoo. She came to the National Zoo in October 1985. Baraka was born at the Zoo in 1992 to Haloko and Gus. He went to the Henry Doorly Zoo in March 2004 and returned to the Zoo in late 2006.
For more information about the Zoo’s gorillas and its conservation efforts, visit www.nationalzoo.si.edu.
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Both mother and baby appear to be doing well. The baby’s sex has not yet been determined.
“We began monitoring the baby as soon as it was discovered and will continue to do so for the next couple of weeks,” said Don Moore, associate director for animal care. “This is a very critical time for the survival of the infant, and all precautions must be taken to ensure that Mandara and her baby are in an environment that is comfortable, safe and controlled. Mandara is a very experienced and competent mother, and we’re confident that she will properly care for and bond with her baby.”
The gorilla birth is significant for the National Zoo. Western lowland gorillas, which are native to tropical forests of West and Central Africa, are listed as critically endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources Red List of Threatened Species, primarily due to habitat loss and fragmentation and poaching. They are also a focus of the Zoo’s participation in Species Survival Plan, in which North American zoos collaborate to encourage the development of a self-sustaining zoo gorilla population, helping to ensure the survival of this endangered species. Each SSP manages the breeding of a species in order to maintain a healthy and self-sustaining population that is both genetically diverse and demographically stable.
Mandara, born at the Lincoln Park Zoo in April 1982, is owned by the Milwaukee Zoo. She came to the National Zoo in October 1985. Baraka was born at the Zoo in 1992 to Haloko and Gus. He went to the Henry Doorly Zoo in March 2004 and returned to the Zoo in late 2006.
For more information about the Zoo’s gorillas and its conservation efforts, visit www.nationalzoo.si.edu.
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Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Giant Squids Land at Dover Air Force Base
A 326th Airlift Squadron aircrew landed at Dover Air Force Base, Del., July 11 with two giant squids in its cargo compartment.
The two sea creatures were transported in a C-17 Globemaster III cargo aircraft from Europe and will be delivered to the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C. The female preserved specimen, which will become the largest on display in the United States, measures 24 and a half feet long. The male is 9 feet long.
"My daughter is going to think I am the coolest dad ever," said Air Force Master Sgt. Phillip Vicker, a 326th AS loadmaster whose mission was to load and balance all of the cargo, including the squids, onto the aircraft.
Even though none of the aircrew or passengers could physically see the squids, Vicker said, everyone could still see the long box labeled with 'giant squids' stickers.
"They were really pumped up about it; they kept asking, 'Are those really squids in there?'" he said. "Even we didn't believe it when we first saw it on the cargo manifest."
The shipping container for the pair of squids was not as long as the actual bodies inside. The project manager at the Smithsonian, Elizabeth Musteen, said this was because the specimens' arms and tentacles were folded over the top of their mantles. However, when on display, the female will be fully expanded horizontally, and the male will be encased in a vertical state, she added.
"These specimens, brought up in deep-sea fishing nets off the coast of northern Spain, are expected to be a main attraction," Musteen said.
The giant squids will make their public debut Sept. 27, when the Smithsonian opens its new Sant Ocean Hall, an exhibition area designed to support ocean education.
"I can't wait to take the family to the display," said Air Force Maj. Mark Chagaris, one of the C-17 pilots who brought the deep ocean dwellers to the United States. "I can say, 'Your daddy helped bring that over here.'"
After unloading the squids from the C-17, four 436th Aerial Port Squadron airmen prepared the squids for transport to the Smithsonian by truck.
"There's nothing we can't handle," said Air Force Airman 1st Class David Strong, one of the four ramp services specialists who moved the 10-tentacled creatures. "If there's anything that needs to be shipped, we take care of it."
Dover's porters work for the world's largest aerial port, and are trained to load or unload cargo weighing 5 to 2 million pounds, and many have experience moving odd objects.
Air Force Senior Airman Michael Goicoechea, a ramp services specialist who helped to move the giant squids, said he has moved cargo ranging from submarines and Stryker vehicles to helicopters and Humvees.
"I was stationed previously at Kadena Air Base, Japan," he said. "But, I've moved more cargo working at Dover Air Force Base in five months than my two years in Kadena, and this is my first squid!"
While not trained to receive every single package, aerial port airmen here deal with all kinds of unexpected cargo.
"That is why our job is never boring," said Tech. Sgt. Steven Braddick, ramp services specialist shift supervisor, who has seen Air Force jets transport dolphins and parts for the space shuttle. "We're always learning and training throughout our career field, because who knows what else we'll be loading?"
By Air Force Master Sgt. Veronica A. Aceveda and Airman 1st Class Shen-Chia Chu
Special to American Forces Press Service
Air Force Master Sgt. Veronica A. Aceveda serves with the 512th Airlift Wing, and Air Force Airman 1st Class Shen-Chia Chu serves with the 436th Airlift Wing.
The two sea creatures were transported in a C-17 Globemaster III cargo aircraft from Europe and will be delivered to the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C. The female preserved specimen, which will become the largest on display in the United States, measures 24 and a half feet long. The male is 9 feet long.
"My daughter is going to think I am the coolest dad ever," said Air Force Master Sgt. Phillip Vicker, a 326th AS loadmaster whose mission was to load and balance all of the cargo, including the squids, onto the aircraft.
Even though none of the aircrew or passengers could physically see the squids, Vicker said, everyone could still see the long box labeled with 'giant squids' stickers.
"They were really pumped up about it; they kept asking, 'Are those really squids in there?'" he said. "Even we didn't believe it when we first saw it on the cargo manifest."
The shipping container for the pair of squids was not as long as the actual bodies inside. The project manager at the Smithsonian, Elizabeth Musteen, said this was because the specimens' arms and tentacles were folded over the top of their mantles. However, when on display, the female will be fully expanded horizontally, and the male will be encased in a vertical state, she added.
"These specimens, brought up in deep-sea fishing nets off the coast of northern Spain, are expected to be a main attraction," Musteen said.
The giant squids will make their public debut Sept. 27, when the Smithsonian opens its new Sant Ocean Hall, an exhibition area designed to support ocean education.
"I can't wait to take the family to the display," said Air Force Maj. Mark Chagaris, one of the C-17 pilots who brought the deep ocean dwellers to the United States. "I can say, 'Your daddy helped bring that over here.'"
After unloading the squids from the C-17, four 436th Aerial Port Squadron airmen prepared the squids for transport to the Smithsonian by truck.
"There's nothing we can't handle," said Air Force Airman 1st Class David Strong, one of the four ramp services specialists who moved the 10-tentacled creatures. "If there's anything that needs to be shipped, we take care of it."
Dover's porters work for the world's largest aerial port, and are trained to load or unload cargo weighing 5 to 2 million pounds, and many have experience moving odd objects.
Air Force Senior Airman Michael Goicoechea, a ramp services specialist who helped to move the giant squids, said he has moved cargo ranging from submarines and Stryker vehicles to helicopters and Humvees.
"I was stationed previously at Kadena Air Base, Japan," he said. "But, I've moved more cargo working at Dover Air Force Base in five months than my two years in Kadena, and this is my first squid!"
While not trained to receive every single package, aerial port airmen here deal with all kinds of unexpected cargo.
"That is why our job is never boring," said Tech. Sgt. Steven Braddick, ramp services specialist shift supervisor, who has seen Air Force jets transport dolphins and parts for the space shuttle. "We're always learning and training throughout our career field, because who knows what else we'll be loading?"
By Air Force Master Sgt. Veronica A. Aceveda and Airman 1st Class Shen-Chia Chu
Special to American Forces Press Service
Air Force Master Sgt. Veronica A. Aceveda serves with the 512th Airlift Wing, and Air Force Airman 1st Class Shen-Chia Chu serves with the 436th Airlift Wing.
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