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Contents of Vanadium and Sulphur in the Blood Cells of Ascidia Mentula and Ascidiella Aspersa

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 May 2009

M. V. Bell ,
B. J. S. Pirie ,
D. B. McPhail ,
B. A. Goodman ,
I.-B. Falk-Petersen  and
J. R. Sargent
M. V. Bell
Affiliation:
N.E.R.C. Institute of Marine Biochemistry, St Fitticks Road, Aberdeen, ABl 3RA
B. J. S. Pirie
Affiliation:
N.E.R.C. Institute of Marine Biochemistry, St Fitticks Road, Aberdeen, ABl 3RA
D. B. McPhail
Affiliation:
Macaulay Institute for Soil Research, Craigiebuckler, Aberdeen, AB9 2QJ
B. A. Goodman
Affiliation:
Macaulay Institute for Soil Research, Craigiebuckler, Aberdeen, AB9 2QJ
I.-B. Falk-Petersen
Affiliation:
Aquatic Biology Group, Institute of Biology and Geology, University of Tromse, PO Box 790, N-9001 Tromsø, Norway
J. R. Sargent
Affiliation:
N.E.R.C. Institute of Marine Biochemistry, St Fitticks Road, Aberdeen, ABl 3RA
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Extract

Henze (1911) was the first to discover large amounts of vanadium and sulphuric acid in the blood of certain species of tunicates. Webb (1939) established that both the sulphuric acid and the vanadium were present in blood in the same cell type, termed a vanadocyte. Since then much further work (reviewed by Goodbody, 1974) has been done on these highly unusual cells. Some species of tunicates accumulate other metals, including iron, titanium, niobium and tantalum (Carlisle, 1968) but the role(s) of these metals and indeed of vanadium itself remains unclear. The vanadium is present in vanadocytes in a reduced cationic form largely as vanadium(III) (Carlson, 1975; Tullius et al. 1980) which is complexed with a chromagen of as yet undefined structure and with sulphate as the counter anion (Bielig et al. 1966). The blood of Ascidia nigra is not capable of reversible oxygen binding (Macara, McLeod & Kustin, 1979), and there has been speculation that the reduced vanadium is involved in the synthesis of the tunic material (see Goodbody, 1974). The tunic of ascidians also contains cells rich in vanadium and sulphuric acid and roles for them in anti-fouling and anti-predation have been considered (Stoecker, 1980a, b).

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom , Volume 62 , Issue 3 , August 1982 , pp. 709 - 716
Copyright
Copyright © Marine Biological Association of the United Kingdom 1982

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References

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