Reproduction: widespread cloning in echinoderm larvae |
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Authors: | Eaves Alexandra A Palmer A Richard |
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Affiliation: | Physiology and Cell Biology Group, Department of Biological Sciences, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta T6G 2E9, Canada. aeaves@ualberta.ca |
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Abstract: | Asexual reproduction by free-living invertebrate larvae is a rare and enigmatic phenomenon and, although it is known to occur in sea stars and brittle stars, it has not been detected in other echinoderms despite more than a century of intensive study. Here we describe spontaneous larval cloning in three species from two more echinoderm classes: a sea cucumber (Holothuroidea), a sand dollar and a sea urchin (Echinoidea). Larval cloning may therefore be an ancient ability of echinoderms and possibly of deutero-stomes - the group that includes echinoderms, acorn worms, sea squirts and vertebrates. |
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