KOCHI: Researchers from the School of Marine Sciences of Cochin University of Science and Technology (Cusat) have unearthed a new species of copepod from the lagoon of Minicoy Island, Union Territory of Lakshadweep. The new species has been named after the place where it was found, Tortanusminicoyensis. The copepods were discovered Dr Sanu V Francis, research scholar and S Bijoy Nandan, head of the Marine Biology Department, while on a taxonomic study in the lagoon waters of Lakshadweep.
Copepods, of all the marine zooplankton, are the most dominant group in marine subtropical and tropical waters and exhibit great diversity in their morphology and habitats.
“Zooplankton copepods are a crucial link between primary producers and higher trophic levels. Any change in copepod populations may disseminate throughout the entire marine ecosystems. Therefore, the study of copepods is of great importance,"said Bijoy Nandan.
"The new species is included in the tropicus group which is mainly distributed in the tropical and subtropical waters of Southeast Asia. This discovery assumes significance because only seven species of the Tortanus genus have been found in the Indian Ocean so far, and a new copepod species is now found after a quarter-century from the Arabian Sea region. These species, under Tortanus genus and the Atortus sub-genus, are found on coral islands," said Nandan.
According to him, the genetic barcodes of the newly discovered organism have been developed and published in the National Center for Biotechnology Information database, the US National Library of Medicine, so that their genetic features can be used by researchers in the rest of the world for comparative studies, and to identify their presence in other marine waters. The discovery has been published in the Turkish Journal of Zoology this month.