Warning: I’m going to write about something unusual… something that might be offensive to those of you with a finer constitution. I am going to write a paper that was published over 25 years ago!
If there is hero worship in science, it’s what I feel for Lisa Levin. Seriously, when I was still an undergrad, I would get all starry-eyed talking about her and her work. When I met her for the first time, after a seminar she gave at Southampton Oceanography Centre (now the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton), I was star-struck in the presence of this slender, quiet, humble lady. I remember trying to help push tables back into their positions after the seminar and accidentally boxing her in between them – she must have seriously doubted my mental capacities. I did, at that moment.
It all started with a paper. I had heard about Dr. Levin before – she is one of those really big names in benthic biology, and she had worked a bunch with my PhD advisor, Andrew Gooday. The wow moment came when, reviewing a ton of literature for my project, I found this.
The paper describes the interactions between three species of polychaetes – a type of marine ‘worm’ – in an intertidal environment, where they occurred in densities of up to 100,000 individuals per square meter. Pseudopolydora paucibranchiata, Streblospio benedictii and Fabricia limnicola live in tubes they build in the sediment. They are filter-feeders, which means they grab their meals in the form of various particles from the surrounding seawater.
In a nutshell, Dr. Levin observed a sediment sample, which had been carefully transported to the lab to leave the assemblage intact, under the microscope for hours and hours, recording every time the animals interfered with each other by touching with their feeding appendages and the reaction this caused. In many instances, the worm doing the touching would make the touchee withdraw all the way into their tubes. She discussed these ongoings in the context of spacing of individuals in the assemblage and costs to fitness of the worms incurred by withdrawal and feeding time loss.
What struck me about the paper at the time were three things:
- It was very clever. Using very simple methods – and a lot of patience – Lisa had produced very interesting results.
- It addressed something that, in my mind, many other benthic biologists had somewhat overlooked up to that point: the fact that organisms in marine sediments – just like in any other environment – interact with each other (duh!). It was so obvious, but she addressed this in such a beautiful way.
- Not least, this wonderful study had been done by a female researcher relatively early in her career – it was part of her PhD project – and she was the sole author of the paper. So confident!
All these things to strive for!
What you can’t tell from this image is that P. paucibranchiata has the longest tentacles – it turned out to be the busiest toucher. Image courtesy of L.A. Levin
L LEVIN (1982). Interference interactions among tube-dwelling polychaetes in a dense infaunal assemblage Journal of Experimental Marine Biology and Ecology, 65 (2), 107-119 DOI: 10.1016/0022-0981(82)90039-9
Hi Steffi – three thoughts:
Yesterday’s seminar speaker referenced a case report from the 19th century. I was most impressed.
Steffi: thank you for a lovely post.
The single thing that I enjoyed the most
From my fleeting scientific past
Was not a paper but a course, when in my last
Year as an undergraduate at Leeds.
My time was ending, and I was taking redes
(apologies for this archaic mote,
It means ‘advice’: I’ll now pursue my note)
Career choices, just in case I missed
My chance to be a palaeontogist.
I attended lectures from a man whose mission
Was flatworms and the means of their nutrition.
He talked of acoels and of commensals
That lived on crabs, on lobsters and on snails
And did it with such evidence of passion
I was enchanted – worms might be the fashion
Of my future path, I might have thought
Had my plans to study fossils come to naught.
Months later, and the doors of chance ajar,
I took an opportunity to spar
Against the bovids of the Pleistocene.
Farewell, my platyhelminth might-have-beens!
You were enchantments for a fleeting hour.
No longer could I spy your fleshy bower
In snail intestines or crustacean gills,
In lungs of fish, or craggy coral sills;
The cunning mechanisms of your lives,
Your backwards biochemistries that thrive
Within your weird mucoglycanic frames.
The man who taught me this? What was his name?
One J. B. Jennings. Long may he remain
For ever after in nostalgia’s frame.
Thanks guys!
Stephen: I am actually on e-mail terms with Lisa; she sent me the images of the three worms. I meant to ask her whether she remembered the tables, but then didn’t… I did ask her what she remembered about doing the study at the time – her reply:
I remember marveling at the fact that the worms under my microscope in the lab didn’t have any idea where they were and seemed to interact just as they would have in the field. Otherwise I’m pretty fuzzy about all of it…
Sounds about right for the last stages of one’s PhD, then and now…
that’s nothing – just wait..
Cath: I love digging around old literature. Fortunately, I picked a discipline that allowed that. What I did not love so much was that, when I was in Southampton, the old guard would dig out their 19th century taxonomic papers, written in German, and ask me to translate… (one actually had a go using an online translating tool – this was in the mid to late 90s…).
Henry: I really have to say, you’re not only sticking with it, it seems to start flowing better :) I can actually imagine what the lecture must have been like. They don’t make professors like that anymore, I think.
Steffi, would you be willing to cross-post a link to this post in the Good Paper Journal Club forum? Thanks!
Most certainly! Is there any particular topic I should link this to (sorry, I’m still a doofus with tagging/crosslinking etc.)?
No, go ahead and create a new topic, methinks….
What I did not love so much was that, when I was in Southampton, the old guard would dig out their 19th century taxonomic papers, written in German, and ask me to translate…
Some would say that a proper PhD program should require that one becomes reasonably competent in reading a second language (my father would say that reading knowledge of two other languages is required). Since my PhD is in developmental biology, I learned to read German, and never regretted it. I love the classic papers in Entwicklungsmechanik, and cited several in my dissertation. I still use some of them in constructing my developmental biology lectures, when I want to discuss the history of a particular research topic.
Great post, Steffi – polychaetes are fascinating, and it was interesting to read how such excellent research was performed using very simple, yet elegant, techniques.
Heather: done. Thanks for the idea!
Kristi: I can’t say that I loved those German papers. They were a b**** to translate (how long can you possibly make one sentence???) – but the drawings were always beautiful :)