Meeting Abstract

P3-42   -   Comparative morphology of extant remora soft tissues Webber-Schultz, AC*; Amplo, HE; Crawford, CH; Flammang, BE; New Jersey Institute of Technology; New Jersey Institute of Technology; University of Louisiana at Lafayette; New Jersey Institute of Technology aw356@njit.edu

Remora fishes are most commonly known for attaching to larger marine organisms such as whales and sharks via an adhesion disc on the top of their head. This adhesion disc uses a combination of hard and soft structures to adhere to hosts. Most of the previous research on remoras has focused on the hard anatomy mechanisms of this adhesion disc. We know that this disc is hierarchically structured with many components that result in a reversible attachment with the ability to stay attached to a wide variety of hosts at high speeds. More recently, research has focused on the function of the soft tissues, hypothesizing that the soft tissues may be a driver of the diversity in host attachments allowing for attachment specificity among some remora species. Herein, we investigate and compare the soft tissue structures near and around the adhesion disc of all 8 living species of remoras, using techniques such as phosphotungstic acid staining and microCT scanning. We aim to better understand the performance of the soft tissues and their role in the evolution of the adhesion disc.