Vitamin A and carotenoids in certain invertebrates. III. Euphausiacea

Abstract

Our published work has shown that the northern euphausiids, Meganyctiphanes norvegica, Thysanoessa raschii and T. inermis , contain much higher concentrations of vitamin A than we have found in any other marine Crustacea (Kon & Thompson, 1949 a ; Batham, Fisher, Henry, Kon & Thompson, 1951; Fisher, Kon & Thompson, 1952, 1953, 1954). In the antarctic species, Euphausia superba , the concentration of vitamin A in samples taken from the alimentary canals of baleen whales (Thompson, Ganguly & Kon, 1949; Kon & Thompson, 1949 b ) was similar to that found in Meganyctiphanes norvegica from the gut of arctic baleen whales (Fisher et al. , 1952), but both were very much lower than in free-swimming M. norvegica . No corresponding free-swimming specimens of Euphausia superba had been analysed.