Abstract
Salinity is an important environmental factor of osmotic pressure which is closely related to growth and development of aquatic organisms. Some physiological studies regarding to challenge of salinity have been reported in marine shellfish. However, information about the effects of acute low-salinity stress on the enzyme activities in ark shell, Scapharca broughtonii, is still limited now. In this study, the enzyme activities of catalase (CAT), superoxide dismutase (SOD) and glutathiones-transferase (GST) in five tested tissues of S. broughtonii under different salinity (10, 15, 20, 25 and 30‰) for different challenged time (24, 48, 72 and 96h) were investigated. The dynamic change of the three enzyme activities after challenged were further analyzed according to the detected data. Results revealed that low-salinity stress generated great change of CAT, SOD and GST activities in organism, but the change peculiarity in different tissues was different in some degree. Especially, two of the five tissues, hepatopancreas and foot, showed special characteristics responding to the low-salinity stress. It also showed that the variations of the three enzymes activities have tissue specificity and time sequentiality in S. broughtonii.
Highlights
The ark shell, Scapharca broughtonii, is one of the most commercially important shellfish distributed in China, Korea and Japan, and has become a popularly cultured species in North China due to its high economic value in recent years (Xia et al, 2015; Zheng et al, 2015)
Previous studies indicated that low-salinity stress could significantly affect the liver antioxidant function of juvenile Nibea albiflora (Yin et al, 2010), and affect the growth rate, survival rate, feed intake, and feed conversion of E. carinicauda; the low-salinity stress could reversely stimulate Pangasianodon hypophthalmus to grow well (Schmitz et al, 2016)
We investigated the change status of three enzyme activities after low-salinity challenge in S. broughtonii
Summary
The ark shell, Scapharca broughtonii, is one of the most commercially important shellfish distributed in China, Korea and Japan, and has become a popularly cultured species in North China due to its high economic value in recent years (Xia et al, 2015; Zheng et al, 2015). In North China, many coastal areas containing rich-nutrient and variety-algae are very suitable for the growth of shellfish, especially in some coastal estuary areas with injection of freshwater (Feng et al, 2015). In such areas, the salinity condition varies frequently, so the organisms that live here should constantly adjust physiological functions to adapt to great salinity change (Lee et al, 2012). This study will be a great significance for improving salinity adaptability and expanding culture fields of S. broughtonii, and provide new insight into osmoregulatory mechanisms of shellfish for accompany acclimation to salinity change
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