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Ontogenetic development and redescription of the whale louse Cyamus boopis Lütken, 1870 (Crustacea: Amphipoda: Cyamidae), ectoparasite of humpback whale Megaptera novaeangliae (Mammalia: Cetacea: Balaenopteridae)

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Abstract

Crustacean amphipods known as whale louse parasitise cetaceans across the world. Taxonomy of the group is generally based on individuals collected during whaling periods and from fresh stranded cetaceans. The only known parasite of Megaptera novaeangliae is Cyamus boopis. Specimens collected from humpback whales stranded on the coast of Brazil were counted, measured, and identified by sex. As C. boopis show a high variation on some diagnostic characters, a redescription of C. boopis is given based on the type series material obtained from the Zoologisk Museum, Copenhagen. A lectotype and four paralectotypes are designated herein. Variation of characters as presence of maxilliped palps and number of acute ventral processes within the Brazilian material is discussed, and should be used with caution for species identification. The proportion of the lateral and accessory gills proved to be good characters to separate C. boopis from the similar species C. catodontis and C. erraticus. Ontogenetic variation of C. boopis is described and remarks on population ecology are provided for the Brazilian material.

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Acknowledgments

The authors are thankful to Vitor Luz Carvalho (AQUASIS), Salvatore Siciliano (GEMM Lagos/FIOCRUZ), Cristiane Kolesnikovas (R3 Animal) and Paulo Ott (GEMARS) for collecting and making available the cyamid material from stranded whales. We are also grateful to Joanne Taylor and Genefor Walker-Smith (Museum Victoria, Australia) for providing sample loans. We are extremely thankful to Jørgen Olesen and Danny Eibye-Jacobsen (Zoological Museum of the University of Copenhagen) for providing the type material and new collection numbers. We thank the Laboratório Central de Microscopia Eletrônica (LCME/UFSC), especially Eliana de Medeiros for SEM assistance. We thank Francisco Eriberto L. Nascimento (Museu Nacional/UFRJ) for making the distribution map. We are particularly grateful to Anna McCallum (Museum Victoria) for the English revision. Finally, Instituto Baleia Jubarte (via Colosio) was sponsored by Petrobras, Iwasa-Arai was supported by Science Without Borders (CsF/CNPq) and by the masters scholarship from the National Counsel of Technological and Scientific Development (CNPq) and Freire was supported by the grant (CNPq 312644/2013-2).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Programa de Pós-Graduação em Zoologia, Museu Nacional/Universidade Federal do Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

    Tammy Iwasa-Arai

  2. Laboratório de Carcinologia, Departamento de Invertebrados, Museu Nacional/UFRJ, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, 20940-040, Brazil

    Tammy Iwasa-Arai & Cristiana Silveira Serejo

  3. Laboratório de Crustáceos e Plâncton, Departamento de Ecologia e Zoologia, Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, SC, 88040-900, Brazil

    Andrea Santarosa Freire

  4. Instituto Baleia Jubarte, Caravelas, BA, 45900-000, Brazil

    Adriana Castaldo Colosio

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  1. Tammy Iwasa-Arai
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  2. Andrea Santarosa Freire
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  3. Adriana Castaldo Colosio
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  4. Cristiana Silveira Serejo
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Correspondence to Tammy Iwasa-Arai.

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Communicated by P. Martinez Arbizu

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Iwasa-Arai, T., Freire, A.S., Colosio, A.C. et al. Ontogenetic development and redescription of the whale louse Cyamus boopis Lütken, 1870 (Crustacea: Amphipoda: Cyamidae), ectoparasite of humpback whale Megaptera novaeangliae (Mammalia: Cetacea: Balaenopteridae). Mar Biodiv 47, 929–939 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12526-016-0532-z

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