DOWNER, Natalie*; LECKY, Danielle; MYRTHIL, Marie; NDUKA, Ebere; CATAPANE, Edward; Medgar Evers College; Medgar Evers College; Kingsborough Community College; Medgar Evers College; Medgar Evers College: Effects of Acute Temperature Stress on the Distribution of Biogenic Amines in the American Oyster, Crassostrea virginica

Biogenic amines are neurotransmitters and hormones in animals. They are well studied in the bivalve mollusc Mytilus edulis, but not as well in oysters, particularly Crassostrea virginica. Previously we detected their presence in C. virginica using an isocratic, ion-pairing HPLC analysis with fluorescence detection and found norepinephrine, epinephrine, octopamine, dopamine and serotonin in various tissues including the visceral ganglia. We now studied the effects of acute temperature stress on the oysters. Oysters were subjected to an increase in temperature from their 18�C aquarium temperature to 32�C over a 45 minute interval and held there for 1 hour. Tissues were then dissected, weighed, homogenized, centrifuged, filtered and injected into a Beckman System Gold HPLC system fitted with a Phenomenex Gemini 5µ C18 column with a guard column and a Jasco FP 2020 Plus Spectrofluorometer with a 16 µL flow cell. The mobile phase was 50 mM acetate buffer (pH 4.7) with 1 mM EDTA and 1.1 mM SOS, and methanol (85%/15%, v/v). The temperature stress caused a significant decrease in norepinephrine, epinephrine, octopamine, dopamine and serotonin in the tissues we analysed, cerebral ganglia, visceral ganglia, heart, gill, palps and mantle. The temperature stress we employed is the same technique used to induce spawning in C. virginica in the lab. We believe the study will be an important step in elucidating neurobiological and neuroendocrine functions in C. virginica and of these biogenic amines in general. The work was supported by grants 1R25GM62003 of NIGMS, 0516041071of NYSDOE, and 66273-0035 and 66288-0035 of PSC-CUNY. We thank Frank M. Flower & Sons, Inc., Oyster Bay, NY for supplying oysters.