International
team of researchers studying biodiversity with an eye toward developing new
drugs
Date: June 19, 2019
Source: University of Massachusetts at Amherst
A newly
identified genus and species of worm-like, freshwater clam, commonly known as a
shipworm, eats rock and expels sand as scat while it burrows like an ecosystem
engineer in the Abatan River in the Philippines.
Local
residents of Bohol Island tipped off an international group of scientists,
including University of Amherst post-doctoral researcher Reuben Shipway, to the
watery location of the bivalve, which the scientists named Lithoredo
abatanica, using the Latin words for rock (litho) and the last two syllables of
shipworm (teredo). Locals call the shipworm "antingaw," and new
mothers are said to eat them in an effort to enhance lactation, Shipway says.
"These
animals are among the most important in the river and in this ecosystem,"
says Shipway, a marine biologist working in the microbiology lab of professor
Barry Goodell and lead author of the paper that describes L. abatanica,
published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B. "As they bore
elaborate tunnels in the limestone bedrock, these animals change the course of
the river and provide a really rich environment for other aquatic species to
live in. So far, this is the only place on earth that we know these animals
exist."
Co-authors
include Marvin Altamia and Daniel Distel of Ocean Genome Legacy Center at
Northeastern University, where Shipway previously worked; Gary Rosenberg of
Drexel University; Gisela Concepcion of the University of the Philippines; and
Margo Haygood of the University of Utah.
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