Adverse effects of chronic ammonia stress on juvenile oriental river prawn (Macrobrachium nipponense) and alteration of glucose and ammonia metabolism

Abstract
Ammonia is one of the common stress factors in aquaculture. However, the effect of chronic ammonia exposure in juvenile oriental river prawn (Macrobrachium nipponense) is currently unexplored. This study explored the effects of chronic ammonia on juvenile healthy oriental river prawns. Fifty prawns (0.123 ± 0.003 g) were exposed to 0, 5, and 15 mg/L total ammonia nitrogen (TAN) in triplicates for 28 days. The effects of chronic ammonia challenge were evaluated on growth, antioxidant capacity, hepatopancreas and gill morphology, and glucose and ammonia metabolism. The results showed that, the chronic ammonia exposure reduced significantly survival rate and weight gain of prawns. The prawns exposed to 15 mg/L ammonia had induced oxidative stress. However, the prawn exposed to 15 mg/L ammonia had significantly lower aspartate aminotransferase, alanine aminotransferase, alkaline phosphatase, and acid phosphatase activities in the serum. Furthermore, exposure of prawns to 15 mg/L ammonia increased the activities of hexokinase, pyruvate kinase, pyruvate and lactic acid content, and glutamine synthase activity. However, the prawns exposed to 15 mg/L ammonia, reduced succinic dehydrogenase, 6-phosphogluconic dehydrogenase, phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase, glutamate synthase, and glutamate dehydrogenase activities but increased ammonia content in serum. The exposure of ammonia deformed lumen, damaged basement membrane and decreased secretory cells in the hepatopancreas, disordered gill epithelial and pillar cells, and caused gill filament base vacuolation. Our study indicates that chronic ammonia stress impairs growth performance, tissue morphology, induces oxidative stress, and alters glucose and ammonia metabolism in juvenile oriental river prawns.
Description
Keywords
ammonia exposure, chronic toxicity, growth performance, histological damage, Macrobrachium nipponense
Citation
Shanshan Wei, Jin Zhang, Wanxin Chen, Anfu Shen, Dongsheng Zhou, Jinxian Zheng, Habib Thiam, Zhili Ding, Samwel Mchele Limbu and Youqin Kong (2022). Adverse effects of chronic ammonia stress on juvenile oriental river prawn (Macrobrachium nipponense) and alteration of glucose and ammonia metabolism. Environmental Toxicology, 38(3): 545-554. https://doi.org/10.1002/tox.23698.