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oai:figshare.com:article/34013202 2026-09-28T10:55:55Z category_62 portal_316 item_type_3 month_year_09_2026

Supplementary file 3_Taxonomy of Arctic sea ice-associated rotifers of the genus Synchaeta based on novel 18S and COI sequences and morphological observations.pdf Miriam Marquardt (8004683) Bodil A. Bluhm (8801552) Rolf Gradinger (2905121) Andreas Altenburger (3543596) Marine Biology Arctic marine rotifers phylogenetics sea ice biodiversity sympagic meiofauna Synchaeta Introduction<p>The microscale brine channels in sea ice create a unique habitat for cold-adapted organisms, including invertebrates like rotifers, nematodes, and harpacticoid copepods, collectively known as sympagic (i.e. ice-associated) meiofauna (>20 µm). Despite their role in the sea ice food web as grazers, aspects related to their function and biodiversity remain poorly studied at the species level. Arctic sea ice rotifers, though commonly occurring across the Arctic seas, have mostly been examined microscopically, with few studies identifying them beyond the phylum level.</p>Methods<p>To address this taxonomic knowledge gap, we investigated the genetic diversity of 41 sympagic rotifer individuals collected in the Barents Sea and Central Arctic Ocean basins between 2019 and 2025. Using general invertebrate/eukaryotic primers targeting the COI and 18S rRNA genes, we performed PCRs and Sanger sequencing on Chelex-extracted DNA of these specimens.</p>Results<p>We found four previously unknown COI lineages of the genus Synchaeta. Morphological observations tentatively associate these four novel lineages with the known ice-associated taxa S. hyperborea, S. tamara, Synchaeta sp. and S. glacialis or S. cecilia. Synchaeta is a common Arctic marine genus that has previously been recorded in sea ice from the Laptev, Greenland and Barents Sea, and Frobisher Bay (Canada).</p>Discussion<p>This study highlights that integrative approaches combining morphological and molecular methods are required to improve biodiversity inventories of Arctic sea ice, as large gaps remain in reference sequence databases.</p> 2026-09-28T10:55:55Z Dataset Dataset 10.3389/fmars.2026.1907633 https://figshare.com/articles/dataset/Supplementary_file_3_Taxonomy_of_Arctic_sea_ice-associated_rotifers_of_the_genus_Synchaeta_based_on_novel_18S_and_COI_sequences_and_morphological_observations_pdf/34013202 CC BY 4.0