SEASONAL AND LATITUDINAL ADAPTATION TO TEMPERATURE IN CRUSTACEANS

Eurythermal crustaceans survive seasonal, diurnal or tidal changes in environmental temperature by developing several capacity and resistanc e adaptations to change their behaviour, physiology, growth and metabo lism. In temperate climates. marked physiological differences have bee n observed between summer and winter crayfish with seasonal changes in haemocyanin oxygen affinity and changes in the relationship between p H and temperature. Rates of protein synthesis in the leg and abdominal muscles of the native British crayfish,. Austropotamobius pallipes. d ecreased with temperature at an exaggerated Q(10) value of 5-10 sugges ting metabolic depression at the low winter temperatures. A similar re sponse was noted in the stenothermal Antarctic isopod, Glyptonotus ant arcticus, as whole animal rates of protein synthesis were extremely lo w in this species when compared to data collected from the temperate m arine isopod, Idotea rescata. This was due to the relatively high ener getic cost of protein synthesis in G. antarcticus in association with low rates of oxygen uptake. Temperature also has an effect on rates of transcription of several proteins in the muscle, including actin and myosin heavy chain (MHC), with an increase in levels of expression as temperature increases in temperate and Antarctic species. The potentia l role of heat shock proteins as an additional strategy in the respons e of temperate crustaceans to thermal stress is discussed. (C) 1998 El sevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.