INTRODUCTION
Biodiversity is the variety of different forms of life on the earth, including
the different plants, animals, micro-organism. the CBD defined biodiversity
as “the variability among living organism from all sources. including
terrestrial and aquatic ecosystem. it also includes ecological complexes in
which they are a part ;that is diversity within species, between species and
diversity of ecosystem. there are three type of diversity according to
Whittaker and modified by Gray. a single sample within a habitat is called
point diversity. A number of samples within a habitat measure alpha
species richness, over a large area samples measure gamma diversity and
at an even larger scale,that of the region or biographical province,epsilon
diversity.(Whitteker, 1985;Gray, 2000).
Ecology is a system when plants,animals,and other abiotic factors are
interacted continusly it is controlled by nature.every plant ,animals are
number of an ecosystem. the different type of ecology include molecular
ecology,organism ecology, population ecology, community ecology,global
ecology,landscape ecology,and ecosystem ecology. Ecology also called bio
ecology bionomics or environmental biology.study of the relationship
between organism and their environment.ecology has long recognaized
that the loss of biological diversity can compromise ecosystem functioning.
The balance of relatively simple communities of plants and animals is more
easily upset than that of richer ones(Iton, 1958; Zavaleta, 2009).in every
ecosystem species interact with each other population has several
characteristic or biological atributes which can be expressed as statistical
function like density abundance, frequency, mortality, natality.species are
interact with each other and show different interactions parasitism,
competition, mutualism etc.
The ocean is great reservoir of life.around 2,50,000(Groom bridge &
Jenkins, 2000) to 2,74,000(Reaka kudla,1997) marine species are currently
described. India has a vast coast line 7500km along the main land with
addition to that of the Andaman Nicobar island in the Bay of Bengal and
INTRODUCTION
the Lakshadweep island in the Arabian sea(Nayak, 2005).there are three
types of shore. sandy, muddy, and rocky. Gujarat has 1650km long coast
line. intertidal areas are at the interface between marine and terrestrial
habitat (Nybakken, 1993;Bertness, 1999;Mouritsen & R.poulin,
2002).intertidal ecosystem are valuable sites for the investigation and
relationship between biodiversity and ecosystem function. rocky shores
are one of the most easily accessible marine habitats and zone between
the land and sea. There are many animals and plant like limpets,
barnacles, seaweeds.
After “arthropods” “the mollusca” has the second largest phylum in the
animal kingdom.it includes best known invertebrates like snails, slugs,
squids, clams, bivalves, dentelium etc. on 25 October 2013, WoRMs
contained 43,696 accepted species of mollusca. throughout history,
molluscs provided a wide range of human resourses including food, shell,
dyes and medicines(K Benkendorff, 2010). the largest mollusc classes-
Gastropoda and Bivalvia have repeatedly and successfully colonized
continental(fresh) water. in many cultures shelled Gastropods and Bivalves
are regarded as delicacy or healthy food also feature in range of traditional
natural remedies(Hu, 1980; Herbert et al.,2003; Prabhakar & Roy, 2009; K
Benkendorff, 2009). Molluscs are diverse not only in term of their species
richness, but also encompass a wide range of morphologies and ecological
niches.they adapted to range of different trophic levels including trophic
niches predatory, herbivorous, scavenging, detritivorous, filter feeding,
symbiotic photo and chemoautotrophs. mollusca are classified into seven
different classes Aplacophora, Monoplacophora, Polyplacophora,
bivalvia(Lamellibranchia), Gastropoda, Cephalopoda and Scaphopoda
based on their symmetry and the characteristics of foot, shell, mantle,
gills, radula etc. Gastropoda include subclass Heterobranchia.
Heterobranch sea sluge are brightly coloured usually shell less(except
Cephalaspidea, Aplysiida, Plurobranchida).soft bodies molluscs comprising
INTRODUCTION
more than 6000 Sp. World wide(Yonow, 2008a;Afreen Hussain et al.,2022)
they were previously groped within ‘Opisthobranchia’ which is now
considered paraphyletic although still an “informal group” among the
“Heterobranchia”(Wagele et al.,2014). Shell less group of Gastropods
developed some unique adaptations to compensate for the lack of shell
protection and slow movement(Marin, 2019; Afreen Hussain et al., 2022).
Being easy prey, they evolved defence strategies like chemical secretion,
colouration for camouflage, warning, mimicry.(Gosliner, 2001; Wagele et
al., 2005; vishal bhave et al., 2022). Class Gasteropoda include subclass
Heterobranchia. Heterobranch refers a subclass of Gastropoda which
includes the snail and sluges they are colourful animals and are
represented from all the marine region of the world. Previously valid
group of Gastropoda Opisthobranchia belongs to this subclass. Taxonomy
of the group of Opisthobranchia still unresolved and dramatic changes are
still being happened(Zapata et al.,2014). Heterobranch is a monophyletic
group which includes the most diverse group of Gastropoda. According to
WoRMs Heterobranchia divides into infraclasses namely Tectibranchia,
Pulmonata, Gymnomorpha, Actenoidea, Allogastropoda, Ringiculoidea
etc(Hazprunar, 1985). Subclass Heterobranch includes many orders like
Nudibranchia(Cuvier, 1817), Plurobranchida, Aplysiida, Cephalaspidea,
Pteropoda, Umbraculida(Odhner, 1939) etc.
Nudibranchs are brightly coloured shell less marine molliuscs with high
species diversity wide distribution range, occurring in coral reefs, seagrass
beds, mangroves, sandy, muddy, and rocky habitats.the current works has
resulted in 292 Sp. Of marine heterobranchia along the coast of India
which are belonging to 6 orders and 53 families(Sreeraj, 2020). Species
diversity was very high in the coral reef areas.
