Classroom-to-Sea Mussel Lab
Time to be a detective! What differences do you find between the anatomy of shallow-water mussels and deep-sea mussels found at hydrothermal vents?
Essential questions
Does the anatomy of shallow-water mussels and deep-sea vent mussels differ, particularly considering their differences in feeding? Is the relative amount of gill tissue shallow-water mussels the same as in deep-sea vent mussels? If not, what might explain the differences?
What you need to do
- Your teacher will provide you with shallow-water mussels. Find out what sort of habitat these mussels came from. For instance, is it an intertidal habitat or a freshwater one?
- Download the lab procedure and datasheet (1.2MB pdf). Follow the lab procedure and your teacher's instructions to dissect the mussels and make measurements.
- Download the deep-sea data set. This dataset contains measurements on deep-sea mussels, made in the same way that you measured your shallow-water mussels.
- Do some background research: see our suggestions in the "useful reading" box on the right.
- Compare your data with the deep sea data. Think about reasons for any differences you see. For instance, might the mussels feed in different ways, and so dedicate different amounts of tissue to feeding versus gas exchange?
- You're now ready to write your report!
