Newly discovered bacteria lives in a unique host organism without brain or sensory organs.
A unique microscopic animal called Xenoturbella, found only in Sweden at the Gullmar Fjord, is the host for the new bacterium discovered by researchers at the Sven Lovén Center for Marine Sciences at the University of Gothenburg.
Living only in long inland saltwater channel north of Gothenburg, the bacterium has been named Endoxenoturbella Lovénii to honor the newly founded marine research center. In a scientific article, Matthias Obst from the university's Department of Zoology describes this species as an endosymbiotic prokaryote living in the gut of a marine worm called Xenoturbella, a creature also unique to Gullmar Fjord, first found in 1915.
This bacteria host, is the size of a thumbnail and possesses a unique body plan that has no brain and no reproductive or sensory organs. This unique creature is key to studies of early evolution in the animal kingdom, and has drawn researchers from all over the world to the Sven Lovén Center for Marine Sciences in Kristineberg ever since it was discovered.