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The World of Protozoa, Rotifera, Nematoda and Oligochaeta

Ref ID : 841

Kathleen Irwin Keating; A system of defined (sensu stricto) media for daphnid (cladocera) culture. Water Research 19(1):73-78, 1985

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MS is a set of defined media. It is comprised of inorganics, plus crystalline vitamin B12 and, usually, a glycylglycine buffer, which are dissolved in distilled-deionized water. Algal and animal media differ only in that algal media contain more phosphate, nitrate and silicate. MS supports the culture of a variety of daphnids. In particular long term (50+ generations), healthy (300+ progeny per mother in 15+ regularly-spaced broods), cultures of Daphnia pulex (de Geer) and D. magna (Stratus) have been maintained. Undefined organics (fish chow, yeast, liver extracts, complex vitamin or protein mixtures) and the uncertain array of inorganic contaminants which they carry are avoided by controlling two trophic levels. Because it can be precisely reproduced in any reasonably equipped laboratory, MS holds promise as a basis for genuinely repeatable daphnid chronic bioassay yielding reproducible results.