Friday, September 9, 2022 – 11:06 am
Al Ain, September 9 / WAM / A team of researchers from the Department of Life Sciences at the College of Science at the UAE University, in cooperation with a number of researchers and international centers in Russia, succeeded in detecting an unknown type of crustacean “Diplostraka” of micro-organisms in the animal kingdom of a semi-circular region. Arabia is within the group of common species.
The discovery was published among the most prestigious scientific journals in the world, led by Professor Walid Hamza from the Department of Life Sciences at the College of Science at the United Arab Emirates University, Professor Alex Kotov, researcher Anna Nertina from the Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution in Russia, and Dr. Khaled Amiri, Director of the Khalifa Center for Biotechnology and genetic engineering, researchers from the Babinin Institute of Inland Water Biology at the Russian Academy of Sciences, and a master’s student from the Department of Life Sciences Professor Shamma Al Neyadi, who spent 21 days at the Russian Institute perfecting her drawings using the world’s most advanced Lucida camera.
Lead researcher Professor Walid Hamza said: “I believe that the discovery of new species that grew in temporary bodies of fresh water, will open the door for many researchers to explore different environments not only in the UAE, but in the Arabian Peninsula, where this region still has a lot to discover, in In fact, expanding our research field and cooperating with world-class institutes will positively enhance our research capabilities, especially when young researchers from UAE nationals participate, which will lead to building national capacities capable of exploring the resources in their land.”
He added: “The importance of this scientific discovery comes in increasing the members of the biodiversity list of living organisms, especially in the UAE. A fact that increases the value of preserving wetland ecosystems as a vital resource that preserves the Earth’s environment and the living creatures in it.. Where the researchers found a new type of organism. Microorganisms in the deserts of the Arabian Peninsula, and this discovery allows to solve some problems related to the history of these daphnids in the northern hemisphere, and to follow the chain of dispersal of these microorganisms across North Africa and the Middle East, and the team was able to study the distribution patterns of biodiversity and the history of its formation in continental waters, As most of the scientific publications on this class relate to the sub-genus, while similar studies have not been conducted, for microorganisms that live primarily in temporary waters.”
He explained: “We succeeded in reaching the identity of the organism, which was identified as a new species and we named it “Daphnia arabica sp. nov. to refer to its presence in the Arabian Peninsula” and to distinguish it from other species, those belonging to another group, which It lives mainly in temporary bodies of fresh water, where researchers collected a basic sample of dry sediments behind the Al Shuwaib Dam Basin / Al Ain City / in March 2018. The disassembled organisms were isolated and grown in the Marine Biology Laboratory at the College of Science at the United Arab Emirates University, with the help of the Khalifa Center for Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology and the Russian Academy of Sciences in Moscow. , an external morphology using the “Lucida Camera”, and further genomic analyzes of the bred species in depth.
Wam / Ali Salem / Dina Omar
