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Fractal analysis highlights analogies in arenaceous tubes of Sabellaria alveolata (Metazoa, Polychaeta) and agglutinated tests of foraminifera (Protista)
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Researchers applied fractal analysis to study the construction patterns of tubeworm (Sabellaria) tubes and foraminifera shells, finding structural similarities between the biological architectures of these distantly related organisms. The comparison provides new insights into how small organisms select and arrange particles when building protective structures. This has implications for understanding biomineral construction and the fate of microplastics, which can be incorporated into such structures.
Bioconstructions of Sabellaria alveolata (Polychaeta Sabellariidae) from southern Sicily (Central Mediterranean) were sampled and analysed through a multidisciplinary approach in order to unravel the construction pattern of arenaceous tubes and explore possible analogies existing between the worm tubes and the agglutinated tests of benthic foraminifera (Protista). Scanning Electron Microscopy and Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy analyses were carried out on entire tubes as well as sectioned ones. Results show that arenaceous tubes are built following a rigorous architectural framework, based on selection and methodical arrangement of the agglutinated grains, and show surprising analogies with the test microstructure previously observed in agglutinated foraminifera. The grain distribution detected in both model species bioconstructions was analysed using a fractal numerical model (Hausdorff fractal dimension). Collected data show that in both organisms the grains were distributed according to a fractal model, indicating that the evolutionary process may have led to finding the same optimal constructive strategy across organisms with an independent evolutionary history, notwithstanding different geometrical scales. Furthermore, in sectioned tubes we observed microplastic fragments agglutinated within the arenaceous wall and in the inter-tube area. This unexpected finding shows that marine animals can be affected by microplastic pollution not only in soft tissues, but also engineered hard structures, and suggests the problem is more pervasive than estimated so far.
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