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The curious and neglected soft-bodied meiofauna: Rouphozoa (Gastrotricha and Platyhelminthes)

  • MEIOFAUNA IN FRESHWATER ECOSYSTEMS
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Abstract

Gastrotricha and Platyhelminthes form a clade called Rouphozoa. Representatives of both taxa are main components of meiofaunal communities, but their role in the trophic ecology of marine and freshwater communities is not sufficiently studied. Traditional collection methods for meiofauna are optimized for Ecdysozoa, and include the use of fixatives or flotation techniques that are unsuitable for the preservation and identification of soft-bodied meiofauna. As a result, rouphozoans are usually underestimated in conventional biodiversity surveys and ecological studies. Here, we give an updated outline of their diversity and taxonomy, with some phylogenetic considerations. We describe successfully tested techniques for their recovery and study, and emphasize current knowledge on the ecology, distribution, and dispersal of freshwater gastrotrichs and microturbellarians. We also discuss the opportunities and pitfalls of (meta)barcoding studies as a means of overcoming the taxonomic impediment. Finally, we discuss the importance of rouphozoans in aquatic ecosystems and provide future research directions to fill in crucial gaps in the biology of these organisms needed for understanding their basic role in the ecology of benthos and their place in the trophic networks linking micro-, meio-, and macrofauna of freshwater ecosystems.

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Acknowledgements

Julian P.S. Smith III was supported by grant P20GM103499 (SC INBRE) from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, National Institutes of Health; Niels Van Steenkiste and Brian Leander were supported by grants from the National Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada (2019-03986) and the Hakai Institute; Maria Balsamo and Loretta Guidi were supported by Scientific Research grants from the Italian Ministry of University (MIUR, 2019). The authors are grateful to Dr. Rick Hochberg for the free and open sharing of his ideas concerning feeding guilds in gastrotrichs, and to Dr. Seth Tyler for pointing us to historical literature on microturbellaria as parasites and hosts.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biomolecular Sciences, University of Urbino, Urbino, Italy

    Maria Balsamo & Loretta Guidi

  2. Centre for Environmental Sciences, Hasselt University, Diepenbeek, Belgium

    Tom Artois

  3. Department of Biology, Winthrop University, Rock Hill, SC, USA

    Julian P. S. Smith III

  4. Department of Life Sciences, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy

    M. Antonio Todaro

  5. Departments of Botany and Zoology, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada

    Brian S. Leander & Niels W. L. Van Steenkiste

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Online resource 1. Results of a recent metabarcoding trial of the amplicon V4/V5 on gastrotrichs (Fegley et al., submitted). (XLS 31 kb)

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Online resource 2. Results of a recent metabarcoding trial of the amplicon V4/V5 on microturbellarians (Fegley et al., submitted). (XLSX 15 kb)

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Balsamo, M., Artois, T., Smith, J.P.S. et al. The curious and neglected soft-bodied meiofauna: Rouphozoa (Gastrotricha and Platyhelminthes). Hydrobiologia 847, 2613–2644 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10750-020-04287-x

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