Christopher Nicolai Roterman- BA, MSc, DPhil
- Senior Teaching Fellow in Marine Biology at University of Portsmouth
Christopher Nicolai Roterman
- BA, MSc, DPhil
- Senior Teaching Fellow in Marine Biology at University of Portsmouth
Course leader in Marine Biology. Deep-sea Ecologist using phylogenetcs, population genomics and morphology
About
47
Publications
12,449
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766
Citations
Introduction
I'm a Swedish-American deep-sea biologist and a long-time UK resident.
I'm course leader for the Marine Biology BSc (Hons) degree course at the University of Portsmouth.
My research centres on deep-sea ecology, using phylogenomic and population genomic tools to understand patterns of life in the deep-sea benthos and in particular, hydrothermal vents.
Current institution
Additional affiliations
August 2021 - present
Position
- Teaching Fellow in Marine Biology
Description
- This is full-time teaching post in marine biology at the University of Portsmouth, which primarily entails devising and delivering lecture and class content (both remotely and in person) to undergraduate and postgraduate students. In addition to lecturing, this post will also include helping to run field courses, project coursework and laboratory practicals. A key aspect of the Teaching Fellowship will be to advance the pedagogy of marine biology i.e. to innovate in the teaching of this broad an
January 2016 - present
Position
- PhD Student
Description
- Exploring patterns of connectivity in deep-water coral associated fauna in the Atlantic using RAD-seq SNP data.
May 2015 - January 2016
Publications
Publications (47)
Yeti crabs (Kiwaidae) are deep-sea hydrothermal vent and methane seep dwelling crustaceans that farm chemosynthetic microbes on their bodies. Sexual dimorphism is a common feature of decapod crustaceans, but little is known about its prevalence in species from deep-sea habitats. We address this knowledge deficit by investigating claw sexual dimorph...
Towards the assessment of North Atlantic deep sea ecosystems’
status: opportunities and challenges unraveled by the ATLAS project.
The amphipod family Podosiridae is unusual in that it combines morphological elements of the disparate families Podoceridae and Eusiridae. Here, we describe a new species in the family from specimens collected from the Southern Ocean in the vicinity of the South Orkney Islands and South Shetland Islands. We present mitochondrial (COI and 16S) and n...
The amphipod family Podosiridae is unusual in that it combines morphological elements of the disparate families Podoceridae and Eusiridae. Here, we describe a new species in the family from specimens collected from the Southern Ocean in the vicinity of the South Orkney Islands and South Shetland Islands. We present mitochondrial (COI and 16S) and n...
Faunal assemblages at hydrothermal vents associated with island-arc volcanism are less well known than those at vents on mid-ocean ridges and back-arc spreading centres. This study characterizes chemosynthetic biotopes at active hydrothermal vents discovered at the Kemp Caldera in the South Sandwich Arc. The caldera hosts sulfur and anhydrite vent...
The recently discovered hydrothermal vent ecosystems in the Southern Ocean host a suite of vent-endemic species, including lepetodrilid limpets dominating in abundance. Limpets were collected from chimneys, basalts and megafauna of the East Scotia Ridge segments E2 and E9 and the Kemp Caldera at the southern end of the South Sandwich Island arc. Th...
Lesson learned in the ATLAS project regarding the challenges and opportunities in achieving “Good Environmental Status” in North Atlantic deep-seas.
Assessing environmental status in North Atlantic deep seas
The recent discovery of two new species of kiwaid squat lobsters on hydrothermal vents in the Pacific Ocean and in the Pacific sector of the Southern Ocean has prompted a re-analysis of Kiwaid biogeographical history. Using a larger alignment with more fossil calibrated nodes than previously, we consider the precise relationship between Kiwaidae, C...
List of primers used in this study.
(DOCX)
Predominant habitats as reported in publications–or observed during specimen collection—along with habitat designation in Beast 2.4.3 discrete trait analyses.
(DOCX)
Maximum likelihood tree topology (best ML tree) of a nine-partition anomuran crustacean dataset generated in IQ-TREE 1.5.4.
Node support numbers represent ML bootstrap percentages from 1000 non-parametric bootstrap replicates.
(TIFF)
Supplementary materials and methods.
(DOCX)
Classification, sampling locations/provenance and voucher ID of the species and GenBank accession numbers of genes used in this study.
'X' denotes missing data. GenBank accession numbers in bold are new sequences from this study and italicised numbers are existing genbank sequences that have been extended.
(DOCX)
Gblocks 0.91 scheme for excising poorly or ambiguously aligned portions of rRNA sequences.
(DOCX)
Substitution models used in this study as determined by PartitionFinder 2.1.1.
(DOCX)
Output from Beast 2.4.3 analyses showing divergence date estimates and % probability of habitat assignment for key nodes within Chirostyloidea and Kiwaidae.
(DOCX)
Maximum likelihood tree topology with the ultrafast bootstrap approximation method of a nine-partition anomuran crustacean dataset generated in IQ-TREE 1.5.4.
Node support numbers represent ultrafast approximate bootstrap percentages from 100,000 replicates.
(TIFF)
Maximum likelihood tree topology (best ML tree) of a fourteen-partition anomuran crustacean dataset generated in IQ-TREE 1.5.4.
Node support numbers represent ML bootstrap percentages from 1000 non-parametric bootstrap replicates.
(TIFF)
Maximum likelihood tree topology with the ultrafast bootstrap approximation method of a fourteen-partition anomuran crustacean dataset generated in IQ-TREE 1.5.4.
Node support numbers represent ultrafast approximate bootstrap percentages from 100,000 replicates.
(TIFF)
Despite the deep sea being the largest habitat on Earth, there are just 77 population genetic studies of invertebrates (115 species) inhabiting non-chemosynthetic ecosystems on the deep-sea floor (below 200 m depth). We review and synthesize the results of these papers. Studies reveal levels of genetic diversity comparable to shallow water species....
We report the first comparative population genetics study for vent fauna in the Southern Ocean using cytochrome C oxidase I and microsatellite markers. Three species are examined: the kiwaid squat lobster, Kiwa tyleri, the peltospirid gastropod, Gigantopelta chessoia, and a lepetodrilid limpet, Lepetodrilus sp., collected from vent fields 440 km ap...
Recently discovered hydrothermal vent fields on the East Scotia Ridge (ESR, 56–60°S, 30°W), Southern Ocean, and the South West Indian Ridge (SWIR, 37°S 49°E), Indian Ocean, host two closely related new species of peltospirid gastropods. Morphological and molecular (mitochondrial cytochrome c oxidase subunit I, COI) characterization justify the erec...
Hydrothermal vents in the Southern Ocean are the physiologically most isolated chemosynthetic environments known. Here, we describe Kiwa tyleri sp. nov., the first species of yeti crab known from the Southern Ocean. Kiwa tyleri belongs to the family Kiwaidae and is the visually dominant macrofauna of two known vent sites situated on the northern an...
The chirostyloid squat lobster Pristinaspina gelasina from the Upper Cretaceous of Alaska is most closely related to members of the genus Kiwa (Kiwaidae) as indicated by the presence of supraocular spines, a medially carinate rostrum and similar carapace groove patterns. Evidence from morphology, strati- graphic position and molecular divergence es...
Microsatellite loci have been developed for three undescribed species discovered at hydrothermal vents on the East Scotia Ridge (ESR) in the Southern Ocean: a yeti crab, Kiwa sp. (Kiwaidae), a species of peltospiroid gastropod and a vent limpet, Lepetodrilus sp. (Lepetodrilidae). Nine, twelve and fourteen loci were developed for the three species r...
The phylogeny of the superfamily Chirostyloidea (Decapoda: Anomura) has been poorly understood owing to limited taxon sampling and discordance between different genes. We present a nine-gene dataset across 15 chirostyloids, including all known yeti crabs (Kiwaidae), to improve the resolution of phylogenetic affinities within and between the differe...
The phylogeny of the superfamily Chirostyloidea (Decapoda: Anomura) has been poorly understood owing to limited taxon sampling and discordance between different genes. We present a nine-gene dataset across 15 chirostyloids, including all known yeti crabs (Kiwaidae), to improve the resolution of phylogenetic affinities within and between the differe...
Since the first discovery of deep-sea hydrothermal vents along the Galápagos Rift in 1977, numerous vent sites and endemic faunal assemblages have been found along mid-ocean ridges and back-arc basins at low to mid latitudes. These discoveries have suggested the existence of separate biogeographic provinces in the Atlantic and the North West Pacifi...
For
Lepetodrilus
n. sp., primers used for amplification and sequencing of cytochrome oxidase I.
(DOC)
Sequences used for phylogenetic analysis of H3 and 28S rDNA to show the relationship of
Vulcanolepas
n. sp. with other stalked barnacles from deep-sea hydrothermal vents.
(DOC)
Sequences used for phylogenetic analaysis of cytochrome oxidase I to show the relationship of
Lepetodrilus
n. sp. with other lepetodrilid limpets from deep-sea hydrothermal vents.
(DOC)
Phylogenetic tree for Anomura based on 16S rDNA. Phylogenetic tree showing the relationships of anomurans, including Kiwa n.sp., derived from a 495-base-pair sequence of the mitochondrial 16S rDNA gene based on Bayesian inference. Values above nodes are Bayesian posterior probability values. Scale bars indicate percent sequence divergence. All node...
For
Vulcanolepas
n. sp., primers used for amplification and sequencing of histone H3 and 28S nuclear rDNA genes.
(DOC)
Phylogenetic tree for Lepetodrilus based on cytochrome oxidase I. Phylogenetic tree showing the relationships of limpets of the genus Lepetodrilus, including Lepetodrilus n. sp. from the ESR (Pseudorimula is used as the outgroup), derived from a 522-base-pair fragment of the mitochondrial cytochrome oxidase I gene based on Bayesian inference. Value...
Multivariate regression trees for seven province models using the Bachraty et al. [8] and combined datasets. (A) Results of geographically constrained clustering using MRTs and a seven province model based on the data from Bachraty et al. [8]. This model recovers all provinces proposed by Bachraty et al. [8], with an additional split in the South E...
Sequences used for phylogenetic analysis of 16S rDNA to show the relationship of
Kiwa
n. sp. with other anomuran taxa.
(DOC)
Phylogenetic tree for Vulcanolepas based on histone H3 and 28S rDNA. Phylogenetic tree showing the relationships of stalked barnacles, including Vulcanolepas n. sp., derived from a concatenated sequence of histone H3 and nuclear 28S rDNA gene 1,223 base pairs in length based on Bayesian inference. Values above nodes are Bayesian posterior probabili...
Results of hierarchical agglomerative cluster analysis of community composition data at species level. The tree is based on the Raup-Crick similarity coefficient, a probabilistic measure for presence/absence data.
(TIF)
Selection of the multivariate regression tree for a global dataset of vent species using different representations of longitude. The dataset is the species data from Bachraty et al. [8], with Southern Ocean vent sites added (combined dataset). Longitude representations are −180° to +180°, centred on Greenwich (red/filled circles/solid line), 0° to...
For
Kiwa
n. sp., primers used for amplification and sequencing of 16S mitochondrial rDNA and 18S and 28S nuclear rDNA genes.
(DOC)
Supplementary information.
(DOC)
Since the first discovery of deep-sea hydrothermal vents along the Galápagos Rift in 1977, numerous vent sites and endemic faunal assemblages have been found along mid-ocean ridges and back-arc basins at low to mid latitudes. These discoveries have suggested the existence of separate biogeographic provinces in the Atlantic and the North West Pacifi...
This report presents the results from the SERPENT project collaborative research with Chevron at the Rosebank deep-water exploration site. SERPENT visited the Stena Carron drill ship in the Faroe Shetland Channel (FSC) to investigate megafaunal diversity at the seabed (1124m depth) and determine the effects of disturbance resulting from the drillin...
This report presents the results from the SERPENT project collaborative research with Shell at the Gro deep-water exploration oil well, drilled from the Leiv Eiriksson in the Norwegian Sea. The study was designed to investigate seabed disturbance resulting from the drilling activities at Gro and the effects of these activities on the benthic enviro...
