Marine & Environmental Sciences Faculty Articles

Temporal Resolution in Mesopelagic Crustaceans

ORCID

0000-0002-9329-2414

Document Type

Article

Publication Title

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences

ISSN

0962-8436

Publication Date

9-29-2000

Keywords

Temporal resolution, Vision, Crustaceans, Deep sea, Flicker fusion

Abstract

Mesopelagic crustaceans occupy a dim-light environment that is similar to that of nocturnal insects. In a light-limited environment, the requirement for greater sensitivity may result in slower photoreceptor transduction and increased summation time. This should be reflected by a lower temporal resolution, as indicated by a lower critical flicker fusion frequency (CFF). Therefore, one would predict that the CFFs of mesopelagic organisms would be relatively low compared with those of their shallow-water relatives, just as nocturnal insects tend to have lower CFFs than diurnal insects. Using an electrophysiological apparatus that was adapted for shipboard use, the dark-adapted CFFs of a variety of species of mesopelagic crustaceans were determined using the electroretinogram. The parameter examined was the maximum CFF-the point at which further increases in irradiance no longer result in a faster flicker fusion frequency. The results summarized here indicate that there is a trend towards lower CFFs with increasing habitat depth, with some interesting exceptions.

DOI

10.1098/rstb.2000.0666

Volume

355

Issue

1401

First Page

1195

Last Page

1198

Comments

©2000 The Royal Society

Additional Comments

NSF grant #: OCE-9730073

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Peer Reviewed

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