Zinc Regulation in the Freshwater Crayfish (Including Some Comparative Copper Analyses)

Abstract

ABSTRACT In the Plymouth area, estuarine decapod crustaceans like Carcinus maenas and Palaemon serratus have much higher concentrations of zinc in the blood than marine species such as Homarus vulgaris and Maia squinado. These differences between species with different powers of osmotic and ionic regulation have not been explained, but they were the starting-point of the present work. This is a study of the freshwater crayfish Austropotamobius pallipes pallipes (Lereboullet) to see whether adaptations to fresh water include modifications in zinc regulation.