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Diets of fan shells (Pinna nobilis) of different sizes: fatty acid profiling of digestive gland and adductor muscle

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Abstract

Pinna nobilis is a large bivalve, endemic to the Mediterranean Sea that was shown in a previous study to ingest significantly different proportions of different food items according to its shell height. Fatty acid profiling of total lipids was used to examine these differences in diet in relation to shell size. Small (shell height 23.0 ± 3.3 cm), medium (SH 41.5 ± 5.5 cm) and large (SH 62.7 ± 4.8 cm) P. nobilis were collected from Mali Ston Bay, Adriatic Sea, in March 2010, and fatty acid analysis was performed on digestive gland and adductor muscle tissues. Based on the analysis of the digestive gland, small P. nobilis were associated with a detrital food chain, characterized by saturated and branched-chain fatty acids, while the diets of medium and large individuals had a greater proportion of polyunsaturated fatty acids. This likely reflects the fact that smaller individuals feed within the benthic boundary layer where the detritus concentrations are high. Fatty acid incorporation into the adductor muscle, likely representative of food taken up over a longer time period, was reversed, that is, larger individuals had lower levels of polyunsaturated fatty acids. This most probably reflects energy expenditure, which typically increases with increasing organism size.

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Acknowledgments

This research was financed by the Croatian Ministry of Science and Technology grant N. 098-0982705-2729 ‘Structure and physiology of microbial communities in northern Adriatic fronts’ and grant N. 001-0013077-0532 ‘Biodiversity and sustainable management of pelagic and demersal resources in the Adriatic’. The authors are grateful to Maro Franušić and Prof. John Davenport for help provided during fieldwork, Ksenija Matošović for laboratory work and Prof. Brian Morton and two anonymous reviewers for useful suggestions that improved the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ruđer Bošković Institute, Center for Marine Research, 52210, Rovinj, Croatia

    Mirjana Najdek & Maria Blažina

  2. Institute of Oceanography and Fisheries, 21000, Split, Croatia

    Daria Ezgeta-Balić & Melita Peharda

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  1. Mirjana Najdek
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  2. Maria Blažina
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  3. Daria Ezgeta-Balić
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  4. Melita Peharda
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Correspondence to Mirjana Najdek.

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Communicated by J. P. Grassle.

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227_2012_2144_MOESM1_ESM.tif

Supplementary material 1 (TIFF 1003 kb). Map of study area showing position (42°51′48′’N, 17°41′00′’E) of sampling station (Black circle)

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Najdek, M., Blažina, M., Ezgeta-Balić, D. et al. Diets of fan shells (Pinna nobilis) of different sizes: fatty acid profiling of digestive gland and adductor muscle. Mar Biol 160, 921–930 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00227-012-2144-x

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