While offspring size is a widely studied concept in evolutionary ecology, mechanisms affecting offspring phenotype in species with postzygotic parental care are incompletely understood. We examined the impact of sibling fusion on ontogenetic shifts in offspring size in the brooding sea anemone Urticina felina. Fusion occurred among brood-protected embryos in U. felina, whereas it occurred postr...

CgNa (Condylactis gigantea neurotoxin) is a 47-amino-acid- residue toxin from the giant Caribbean sea anemone Condylactis gigantea. The structure of CgNa, which was solved by 1H-NMR spectroscopy, is somewhat atypical and displays significant homology with both type I and II anemone toxins. CgNa also displays a considerable number of exceptions to the canonical structural elements that are thoug...

Using enzyme electrophoresis and nematocyst analysis, the sympatrically occurring "light" and "dark" color morphs of the sea anemone Anthopleura orientalis from the Sea of Japan were shown to be two valid species. The "light" morph was identified as A. orientalis (Averintsev, 1967 Issledovaniya fauny morei: Vyp. 5 (13). Nanka, Leningrad, pp. 62-77), while the "dark" morph was designated as Anth...

In the natural world, there are many creatures with venoms that have interesting and varied activities. Although the sea anemone, a member of the phylum Coelenterata, has venom that it uses to capture and immobilise small fishes and shrimp and for protection from predators, most sea anemones are harmless to man. However, a few species are highly toxic; some have venoms containing neurotoxins, r...

Sea anemone (Cnidaria, Anthozoa) venom is an important source of bioactive compounds used as tools to study the pharmacology and structure-function of voltage-gated K+ channels (KV). These neurotoxins can be divided into four different types, according to their structure and mode of action. In this work, for the first time, two toxins were purified from the venom of Bunodosoma caissarum populat...

A fluorescent protein was identified and cloned from the deep-sea anemone Cribrinopsis japonica. Bioluminescence and fluorescence expression were examined by direct observations of live specimens and RNA-Seq analysis. Both approaches revealed a novel green fluorescent protein in the tentacles of the anemone, but bioluminescence was not observed. Behavioural observations revealed that a blue lig...

The multigene family of equinatoxins, pore-forming proteins from sea anemone Actinia equina, has been studied at the protein and gene levels. We report the cDNA sequence of a new, sphingomyelin inhibited equinatoxin, EqtIV. The N-terminal sequences of natural Eqt I and III were also determined, confirming two isoforms of EqtI, differing at position 13. The number of Eqt genes determined by Sout...