Polyunsaturated fatty acids in fish tissues more closely resemble algal than terrestrial diet sources
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PRIMARY RESEARCH PAPER
Polyunsaturated fatty acids in fish tissues more closely resemble algal than terrestrial diet sources Nadine Ebm . Fen Guo Martin J. Kainz
. Michael T. Brett
. Stuart E. Bunn
.
Received: 15 July 2020 / Revised: 13 October 2020 / Accepted: 15 October 2020 Ó The Author(s) 2020
Abstract The River Continuum Concept implies that consumers in headwater streams have greater dietary access to terrestrial basal resources, but recent studies have highlighted the dietary importance of high-quality algae. Algae provide consumers with physiologically important omega-3 (n-3) polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA), particularly eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA). However, terrestrial plants and most benthic stream algae lack the long-chain (LC) n-3 PUFA docosahexaenoic acid (DHA, 22:6n-3), Handling editor: Michael Power
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s10750-020-04445-1) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. N. Ebm M. J. Kainz (&) WasserCluster Lunz – Inter-university Center for Aquatic Ecosystem Studies, 3293 Lunz Am See, Austria e-mail: [email protected] N. Ebm e-mail: [email protected] N. Ebm Functional and Evolutionary Ecology, Faculty of Life Sciences, University of Vienna, 1090 Vienna, Austria F. Guo Simon F.S. Li Marine Science Laboratory, School of Life Sciences, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China e-mail: [email protected]
which is essential for neural development in fish and other vertebrates. We sampled subalpine streams to investigate how the PUFA composition of neural (brain and eyes), muscle, and liver tissues of freshwater fish is related to their potential diets (macroinvertebrates, epilithon, fresh and conditioned terrestrial leaves). The PUFA composition of consumers was more similar to epilithon than to terrestrial leaves. Storage lipids of eyes most closely resembled dietary PUFA (aquatic invertebrates and algae). However, DHA and arachidonic acid (ARA, 20:4n-6) were not directly available in the diet but abundant in organs. This implies that algal PUFA were selectively retained or were produced internally via enzymatic PUFA conversion by aquatic consumers. This field study demonstrates the nutritional importance of algal M. T. Brett Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA e-mail: [email protected] S. E. Bunn Australian Rivers Institute, Griffith University, Nathan, QLD 4111, Australia e-mail: [email protected] M. J. Kainz Department for Biomedical Research, Danube University Krems, Krems an der Donau, Austria
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Hydrobiologia
PUFA for neural organs in aquatic consumers of headwater regions. Keywords Stream food webs Food quality Headwaters Fish brain Fish eyes Docosahexaenoic acid
Introduction At the base of aquatic food webs, primary producers, e.g., microalgae, provide consumers with dietary nutrients, including essential polyunsatur
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