Molecular Mechanism of Shellfish
Neurotoxicity of inorganic mercury in Mactra chinensis philippi
Hg2+ affected Mactra in metabolic pathways, neurotransmitters and Ca2+
- Metabolic pathways: mainly included glycolysis; citrate cycle; nucleotide metabolism; alanine, aspartate and glutamate metabolism; nucleotide metabolism and osmotic regulation.
- Neurotransmitters and related enzymes: the neurotransmitters included increased glutamate, decreased nitric oxide and acetylcholine, the related enzymes included increased nitric oxide synthase and decreased acetylcholinesterase.
- Concentration of Ca2+: led to calcium overload
Identified 4 C-type lectins involved in innate immune responses in Venerupis philippinarum
- In the study, four c-type lectins were identified and characterized from the manila clam Venerupis philippinarum (designed as VpClec-1, VpClec-2, VpClec-3 and VpClec4 respectively).
- Multiple alignments and phylogenetic analysis strongly suggested that they were new members of the c-type lectin superfamily.
- After Vibrio anguillarum challenge, the temporal expression of all c-type lectins transcripts was up-regulated.
- They displayed broad agglutination and antibacterial activities towards Vibrio harveyi, Vibrio splendidus, Vibrio anguillarum, Enterobacter cloacae and Aeromonas hydrophila.
- All the results showed that four C-type lectins functioned as pattern recognition receptors (PRRs) with distinct recognition spectrum, and involved in the innate immune responses of manila clams.
