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Characterization of hemocyanin from the peacock mantis shrimp Odontodactylus scyllarus (Malacostraca:Hoplocarida)

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Abstract

Hemocyanin is the blue respiratory protein of many arthropod species. While its structure, evolution, and physiological function have been studied in detail in Decapoda, there is little information on hemocyanins from other crustacean taxa. Here, we have investigated the hemocyanin of the peacock mantis shrimp Odontodactylus scyllarus, which belongs to the Stomatopoda (Hoplocarida). O. scyllarus hemocyanin forms a dodecamer (2 × 6-mer), which is composed of at least four distinct subunit types. We obtained the full-length cDNA sequences of three hemocyanin subunits, while a fourth cDNA was incomplete at its 5′ end. The complete full-length cDNAs of O. scyllarus hemocyanin translate into polypeptides of 650–662 amino acids, which include signal peptides of 16 or 17 amino acids. The predicted molecular masses of 73.1–75.1 kDa correspond well with the main hemolymph proteins detected by SDS-PAGE and Western blotting using various anti-hemocyanin antibodies. Phylogenetic analyses show that O. scyllarus hemocyanins belong to the β-type of malacostracan hemocyanin subunits, which diverged from the other subunits before the radiation of the malacostracan subclasses around 520 million years ago. Molecular clock analysis revealed an ancient and complex pattern of hemocyanin subunit evolution in Malacostraca and also allowed dating divergence times of malacostracan taxa.

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Abbreviations

EST:

Expressed sequence tag

Hc:

Hemocyanin

ML:

Maximum likelihood

MYA:

Million years ago

PCR:

Polymerase chain reaction

SDS-PAGE:

Sodium dodecyl sulfate-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis

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Acknowledgments

This work is supported by a grant of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (Bu956/9). The nucleotide sequences reported in this paper have been submitted to the EMBL/GenBank™ Nucleotide Sequence Databases under the accession numbers FM999828 to FM999831.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Biocenter Grindel, Institute of Zoology and Zoological Museum, University of Hamburg, Martin-Luther-King-Platz 3, 20146, Hamburg, Germany

    Samantha Scherbaum, Beyhan Ertas & Thorsten Burmester

  2. Institute of Zoology, University of Mainz, 55128, Mainz, Germany

    Wolfgang Gebauer

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  1. Samantha Scherbaum
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  2. Beyhan Ertas
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  3. Wolfgang Gebauer
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  4. Thorsten Burmester
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Thorsten Burmester.

Additional information

Communicated by G. Heldmaier.

See Table 1 for abbreviations of hemocyanins.

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Scherbaum, S., Ertas, B., Gebauer, W. et al. Characterization of hemocyanin from the peacock mantis shrimp Odontodactylus scyllarus (Malacostraca:Hoplocarida). J Comp Physiol B 180, 1235–1245 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00360-010-0495-5

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