Category:Media from Justine et al. 2020 - PeerJ/10098

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Jean-Lou Justine​, Delphine Gey, Jessica Thévenot, Romain Gastineau, Hugh D. Jones

(2020). "The land flatworm Amaga expatria (Geoplanidae) in Guadeloupe and Martinique: new reports and molecular characterization including complete mitogenome". PeerJ 8: e10098. DOI:10.7717/peerj.10098. ISSN 2167-8359.

The land flatworm Amaga expatria (Geoplanidae) in Guadeloupe and Martinique: new reports and molecular characterization including complete mitogenome 

Scientific paper
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Instance of	scholarly article
Main subject	Amaga expatria Geoplanidae (Geoplanidae) mitochondrial DNA
Author	Jean-Lou Justine (1) Delphine Gey (2) Jessica Thévenot (3) Romain Gastineau (4) Hugh D. Jones (5)
Published in	PeerJ
Copyright license	Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (2020–)
Publication date	9 November 2020
Authority file  Q102422545 DOI: 10.7717/PEERJ.10098 PubMed ID: 33240595 PMCID: 7659627 Reasonator Scholia Wikidocumentaries PetScan statistics WikiMap Locator tool KML file Search depicted

Abstract
Background The land flatworm Amaga expatria Jones & Sterrer, 2005 (Geoplanidae) was described from two specimens collected in Bermuda in 1963 and 1988 and not recorded since.

Methods On the basis of a citizen science project, we received observations in the field, photographs and specimens from non-professionals and local scientists in Martinique and Guadeloupe. We barcoded (COI) specimens from both islands and studied the histology of the reproductive organs of one specimen. Based on Next Generation Sequencing, we obtained the complete mitogenome of A. expatria and some information on its prey from contaminating DNA.

Results We add records from 2006 to 2019 in two French islands of the Caribbean arc, Guadeloupe (six records) and Martinique (14 records), based on photographs obtained from citizen science and specimens examined. A specimen from Martinique was studied for histology of the copulatory organs and barcoded for the COI gene; its anatomy was similar to the holotype, therefore confirming species identification. The COI gene was identical for several specimens from Martinique and Guadeloupe and differed from the closest species by more than 10%; molecular characterisation of the species is thus possible by standard molecular barcoding techniques. The mitogenome is 14,962 bp in length and contains 12 protein coding genes, two rRNA genes and 22 tRNA genes; for two protein genes it was not possible to determine the start codon. The mitogenome was compared with the few available mitogenomes from geoplanids and the most similar was Obama nungara, a species from South America. An analysis of contaminating DNA in the digestive system suggests that A. expatria preys on terrestrial molluscs, and citizen science observations in the field suggest that prey include molluscs and earthworms; the species thus could be a threat to biodiversity of soil animals in the Caribbean.