Immunofluorescence identification of early life history stages of scallops (Pectinidae)

Abstract

Species identification is the major limiting step in the study of early life history stages of bivalves. Due to the morphological similarity of veligers, sorting large numbers of plankton samples by traditional methods is a laborious and time-consuming task. The use of monoclonal antibodies and indirect irnmunofluorescence provides the means to rapidly discriminate among species. We describe the development of monoclonal antibodies specific to the veligers of scallop and methods to sort scallop veliger from plankton samples. Although the monoclonal antibodies were prepared against larvae of the giant scallop Placopecten magellanicus, they also recognized some adult tissues of Chlamys island>ca. The monoclonal antibodies also recognized giant scallop larvae of different age groups and from different populations of the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the Canadian Atlantic Coast. The rapidity and the efficiency of this method offers the opportunity to increase the size and number of samples which is necessary when scallop veligers represent a small component of the total veliger community.