Meeting Abstract
In hydrodynamically turbulent marine environments, the settlement and survival of marine organisms depend on a strong attachment to the ocean floor. Marine mussels achieve this by anchoring themselves to rocks with stretchy, collagen-like fibers (known as byssal threads) that are tipped with a natural adhesive. Synthesized in seawater the glue that mussels’ use is a biomechanical marvel due to its unique ability to adhere to a variety of conventionally challenging surfaces, all while in the presence of water, salts, and polar organic molecules. However, despite the adhesive’s notoriety little is known about how the glue “cures” in natural environments and under what seawater conditions this process is either accelerated or retarded – information that could be ecologically and economically relevant as seawater conditions change as a result of ocean acidification, the expansion of hypoxic zones, and increases in sea-surface temperatures predicted by climate models. Here we describe laboratory experiments wherein mussels made byssal attachments to mica sheets that then matured in a range of different temperature, dissolved oxygen, and seawater pH conditions for up to two weeks and were then pulled to failure using a materials testing machine. We then coupled these results with protein separations from mussel adhesives using 2D gel electrophoresis to look for bulk changes in the mussel adhesive proteins that were present. Results from these assays provide insights into which environmental factors promote strong byssal attachment and inform commercial aquaculture facilities about which seawater variables should be monitored to better identify and adapt to unfavorable growing conditions.
