Metabolic profiling of <i>Mytilus coruscus</i> mantle in response of shell repairing under acute acidification

by Xiaojun Fan, Ying Wang, Changsheng Tang, Xiaolin Zhang, Jianyu He, Isabella Buttino, Xiaojun Yan, Zhi Liao

Mytilus coruscus is an economically important marine bivalve mollusk found in the Yangtze River estuary, which experiences dramatic pH fluctuations due to seasonal freshwater input and suffer from shell fracture or injury in the natural environment. In this study, we used intact-shell and damaged-shell M. coruscus and performed metabolomic analysis, free amino acids analysis, calcium-positive staining, and intracellular calcium level tests in the mantle to investigate whether the mantle-specific metabolites can be induced by acute sea-water acidification and understand how the mantle responds to acute acidification during the shell repair process. We observed that both shell damage and acute acidification induced alterations in phospholipids, amino acids, nucleotides, organic acids, benzenoids, and their analogs and derivatives. Glycylproline, spicamycin, and 2-aminoheptanoic acid (2-AHA) are explicitly induced by shell damage. Betaine, aspartate, and oxidized glutathione are specifically induced by acute acidification. Our results show different metabolic patterns in the mussel mantle in response to different stressors, which can help elucidate the shell repair process under ocean acidification. furthermore, metabolic processes related to energy supply, cell function, signal transduction, and amino acid synthesis are disturbed by shell damage and/or acute acidification, indicating that both shell damage and acute acidification increased energy consumption, and disturb phospholipid synthesis, osmotic regulation, and redox balance. Free amino acid analysis and enzymatic activity assays partially confirmed our findings, highlighting the adaptation of M. coruscus to dramatic pH fluctuations in the Yangtze River estuary.