dinoflagellate sulcus

GO:0097612 · Other · Subcellular region · Proposed

A cell surface furrow that occurs on the ventral side of a dinoflagellate cell. It partially houses the longitudinal flagellum. The sulcus intersects with the cingulum on the ventral side of a dinoflagellate cell. [GO:0097612]

Synonyms: sulcus; longitudinal furrow; longitudinal groove

UniProt location names: UniProt Consortium, CC BY 4.0. Reference label and route sources.

Taxonomic distribution

NCBITaxon:2864 Dinophyceae — VARIABLE: GO:0097612 places this ventral cell-surface furrow in Dinophyceae and defines it as partially housing the longitudinal flagellum. [GO:0097612]

Mechanism graphs

Sulcus-cingulum topology (FUNCTION)

The dinoflagellate sulcus is a ventral cell-surface furrow that intersects the dinoflagellate cingulum.

Subject	Predicate	Object	Evidence
dinoflagellate sulcus	is a	cell surface furrow	`GO:0097612` The GO graph links GO:0097612 to GO:0097610 by rdfs:subClassOf.
dinoflagellate sulcus	intersects	dinoflagellate cingulum	`GO:0097612` The GO:0097612 definition describes the dinoflagellate sulcus as intersecting the cingulum ventrally.

Discussions

CURATION_TODO (OPEN): Add sulcus molecular components only after directly localized constituents and exact source-neutral family groundings have been identified. GO defines the dinoflagellate sulcus as a cell-surface furrow and places it in Dinophyceae, but this pass did not find exact family-level evidence for sulcus-specific molecular constituents.
INTERPRETATION (RESOLVED): Keep dinoflagellate sulcal notch separate from the general dinoflagellate sulcus unless curating the narrower GO:0097618 class. GO:0097618 is a child of GO:0097612 for a sulcus that extends to the posterior antapex and makes the hypocone appear bilobed, so it should not be folded into this general sulcus record as an exact synonym or duplicate identifier.

Evidence

GO:0097612 Gene Ontology cellular-component term for the dinoflagellate sulcus.
GO:0097610 Gene Ontology cellular-component parent term for cell surface furrow.
GO:0097611 Gene Ontology cellular-component term for the dinoflagellate cingulum, which the GO:0097612 definition names as the furrow intersected by the sulcus.
PMID:7002229 PubMed record for Taylor 1980, the subscription Biosystems dinoflagellate-evolution review cited by GO:0097612; EuropePMC reported no PMC, open-access, full-text, or PDF route in this pass.
DOI:10.1016/0303-2647(80)90006-4 Crossref and EuropePMC metadata identify DOI:10.1016/0303-2647(80)90006-4 as the Taylor 1980 Biosystems review behind PMID:7002229; no article-body text was reachable through the checked metadata routes, so this record uses it only as bibliographic corroboration for the GO definition xref.

Curation history

2026-10-02T17:17:06Z codex · CREATED_RECORD — Scaffolded by scripts/new_record.py
2026-10-02T17:17:55Z codex · EXPANDED_RECORD — Added GO sulcus synonymy, GO cell-surface-furrow parentage, Dinophyceae taxon evidence, record-level PMID/DOI evidence, a nonmechanistic sulcus/cingulum topology graph, and a curation TODO for sulcus molecular components.
2026-10-02T17:31:19Z codex · ADDRESSED_PR_REVIEW — Addressed PR #1927 review issues #1928 and #1929 by adding GO:0097611 evidence for the cingulum graph node and documenting GO:0097618 dinoflagellate sulcal notch as narrower than the general sulcus.

Source: data/structures/other/dinoflagellate_sulcus.yaml