Studies on woloszynskioid dinoflagellates II: On Tovellia sanguinea sp. nov., the dinoflagellate responsible for the reddening of Lake Tovel, N. Italy
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AbstractThe organism responsible for the former annual reddening of Lake Tovel in the Italian Alps (up to 1964) has been identified and studied in detail. Considerable confusion exists regarding the identity of this organism, and the detailed description by Baldi in 1941 is now believed to be based on more than one organism. Baldi's red and green forms appear to be two different organisms, both of which have now been isolated into unialgal culture and studied using light microscopy, electron microscopy, and sequencing of the large subunit of ribosomal DNA (LSU rDNA). The organism has been found in three lakes in the area, but only in Lake Tovel have conditions allowed for reddening of the water during summer. The name of the organism believed to be the cause of the reddening, Glenodinium sanguineum Marchesoni, used in numerous publications, is an illegitimate homonym of G. sanguineum H.J. Carter, and the organism is described here as a new species, Tovellia sanguinea sp. nov., the seventh species of the newly described genus Tovellia. T. sanguinea is closely related to the other red-coloured species of Tovellia, Tovellia coronata (previously known as Woloszynskia coronata) but differs in several morphological features, notably the chloroplast arrangement, and in LSU rDNA sequence divergence (11-12%). Cells preserved from Lake Tovel during a reddening phenomenon in 1938 have been re-examined by scanning electron microscopy and agree morphologically with the new isolates. Tovellia sanguinea is a species of oligotrophic or mesotrophic-oligotrophic cold-water lakes, in which the average summer temperature does not exceed 15°C. It occurs on both calcareous (as in Lake Tovel) and non-calcareous substrata (as in the other two lakes). |
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Journal | European Journal of Phycology |
| Volume | 41 |
| Pages (from-to) | 47-65 |
| ISSN | 0967-0262 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 2006 |
ID: 1096783