Evolutionary morphology of the organ systems in squat lobsters and porcelain crabs (crustacea: Decapoda: Anomala): an insight into carcinization.

Porcelain crabs (Porcellanidae) are one of three taxa within anomuran crustaceans (Anomala) which possess a crab-like body form. Curiously, these three lineages evolved this shape independently from true crabs (Brachyura) in the course of the evolutionary process termed carcinization. The entire pleon in porcelain crabs is flexed under the cephalothorax and the carapace is approximately as broad as long. Despite their crab-like habitus, porcelain crabs are phylogenetically nested within squat lobsters (Munidopsidae, Munididae, Galatheidae). With a pleon which is only partly flexed under the cephalothorax and a cephalothorax which is longer than it is broad, squat lobsters represent morphologically intermediate forms between lobster-like and crab-like body shapes. Carcinization has so far mostly been studied with respect to outer morphology; however, it is evident that internal anatomical features are influenced through this change of body shape too. In this paper, the situation in Galatheoidea is elucidated by adding more taxa to existing descriptions of the hemolymph vascular systems and associated structures and organs. Micro-computer tomography and 3D reconstruction provide new insights. Autapomorphic states of various internal anatomical characters are present in nearly all the studied species, also reflecting some degree of anatomical disparity found within Galatheoidea. The ventral vessel system of porcelain crabs differs distinctly from that of squat lobsters. The differences in question are coherent (i.e. structural dependent) with morphological transformations in the integument, such as the shortening of the sternal plastron, which evolved in the course of carcinization. Shifts in the gonads and the pleonal neuromeres are coherent with the loss of the caridoid escape reaction, which in turn is a consequence of carcinization. The arterial transformations, however, are minor compared to other instances of carcinization in anomuran crustaceans since the last common ancestor of squat lobsters and porcelain crabs was already "half carcinized".