Plakobranchus ocellatus

Plakobranchus ocellatus is a species of sea slug, a sacoglossan, a marine opisthobranch gastropod mollusk in the family Plakobranchidae.

[1] Recent work on the photosynthetic abilities of Plakobranchus reveals that P. ocellatus is actually a species complex consisting of at least four distinct clades.

The dorsal surface of the sea slug has a number of longitudinal ridges, but when at rest, the parapodia are folded up over the midline of the body so that the dorsal surface is concealed from view.

[3] The ground colour of this sea slug is usually pale green, beige, or cream with large ocelli (spots similar to eyespots) of cream, brown, pink, and purple in varying shades.

[1] These seaslugs live in sheltered, shallow water habitats with stones or gravel and silt.

Plakobranchus ocellatus , head end towards the left
Dorsal view of a freshly collected intact Plakobranchus ocellatus showing its head, rhinophores and parapodia .
Dorsal view of an anesthetized individual of Plakobranchus ocellatus with spread parapodia. Stomach and branched digestive glands are visible. The tissue region in the red square was dissected and used for DNA extraction in the study by Maeda T. et al. (2012). [ 4 ]