Helena Wiklund

PhD student, Systematics and Biodiversity

Tel: 46 (0)31 786 38 27 | helena.wiklund@zool.gu.se

Research interest

My PhD-project "Biodiversity in marine chemoautotrophic environments" started in February 2005, with Dr Thomas Dahlgren as supervisor. I study phylogeny, taxonomy and population genetics in polychaetes living on sunken whale-falls. Two stranded whale carcasses have been experimentally implanted in Kosterfjord close to Tjärnö Marine Biological Laboratory, a Minke Whale at 125 m depth and a Pilot Whale at 30 m. From these whale-falls we collect bones with associated fauna, and keep them in tanks with running seawater for further studies. So far we have found several new polychaete species, and with molecular methods (DNA-sequencing) we investigate their phylogeny and population genetics. Link to whale-fall project

Publications

Wiklund H, Glover AG, Dahlgren TG. 2009. Three new species of Ophryotrocha (Annelida: Dorvilleidae) from a whale-fall in the North East Atlantic. Zootaxa 2228: 43-56.

Wiklund H, Glover AG, Johannessen PJ, Dahlgren TG. 2009. Cryptic speciation at organic-rich marine habitats: a new bacteriovore annelid from whale-fall and fish farms in the North East Atlantic. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 155: 774-785.

Wiklund H, Nygren A, Pleijel F, Sundberg P. 2008. The phylogenetic relationships between Amphinomidae, Archinomidae and Euphrosinidae (Amphinomida: Aciculata: Polychaeta), inferred from molecular data. Journal of the Marine Biological Association (UK) 88(3):509-513.

Pleijel F, Rouse G, Ruta C, Wiklund H, Nygren A. 2008. Vrijenhoekia balaenophila, a new hesionid polychaete from a whale fall off California. Zoological Journal of the Linnean Society 152: 625-634.

Ruta C, Nygren A, Rousset V, Sundberg P, Tillier A, Wiklund H, Pleijel F. 2007. Phylogeny of Hesionidae (Aciculata, Polychaeta), assessed from morphology, 18S rDNA, 28S rDNA, 16S rDNA and COI. Zoologica Scripta 36(1): 99-107.

Dahlgren TG, Wiklund H, Källström B, Lundälv T, Smith CR, Glover AG. 2006. A shallow-water whale-fall experiment in the north Atlantic. Les Cahiers de Biologie Marine 47(4): 385-389.

Wiklund H, Nygren A, Pleijel F, Sundberg P. (2005) Phylogeny of Aphroditiformia (Polychaeta) based on molecular and morphological data. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 37, 494-502.

Popular science publications

Dahlgren TG, Wiklund H. (2006) Hur vi streckkodade Moby Dick. Fauna och Flora 2, 8-9.