Maternal diet and larval diet influence survival skills of larval red drum Sciaenops ocellatus

Metabolic programming occurs when variations in nutrition during a specific developmental window result in long-term metabolic effects. It has been studied almost exclusively in humans and other mammals but never in an ecological context. Here, we report metabolic programming and its functional consequences in a marine fish, red drum. We demonstrate that maternal provisioning of eggs with an essential fatty acid, docosahexaenoic acid (DHA), varies with DHA content of the maternal diet. When offspring are reared on a DHA-replete diet, whole-body DHA content of offspring depends upon the amount of DHA that was in the egg. We further demonstrate that whole-body DHA content is correlated with traits related to offspring fitness (escape responses, routine swimming, growth, and survival). DHA content of red drum eggs produced in nature is in the range where the effects of metabolic programming are most pronounced. Our findings indicate that during a brief developmental window, DHA plays a role in establishing the metabolic capacity for its own uptake or storage, with protracted and possibly permanent effects on ecologically important survival skills of individuals and important implications for dynamics of populations and food webs.

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Dynamics of diet-egg transfer of fatty acids in the teleost fish, red drum ( Sciaenops ocellatus )

Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B Biological Sciences ◽

10.1098/rstb.2019.0646 ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 375 (1804) ◽

pp. 20190646 ◽

Cited By ~ 2

Author(s):

Zhenxin Hou ◽

Cynthia K. Faulk ◽

Lee A. Fuiman

Keyword(s):

Fatty Acids ◽

Fatty Acid ◽

Maternal Diet ◽

Red Drum ◽

Dietary Fatty Acids ◽

Sciaenops Ocellatus ◽

Diet Shift ◽

Fatty Acid Profiles ◽

Marine Food Webs ◽

Batch Spawning

Eggs of marine organisms are increasingly being recognized as important components of marine food webs. The degree to which egg fatty acid profiles reflect maternal diet fatty acid profiles, and therefore the value of fatty acids in eggs as trophic biomarkers, depends on the species' reproductive strategy and the extent of modification of ingested fatty acids. We measured the dynamics of transfer of recently ingested fatty acids to spawned eggs in a batch-spawning teleost, red drum ( Sciaenops ocellatus ). Results of 21 diet-shift experiments, from which the fatty acid profiles of the diets and eggs were compared, showed that 15 of 27 fatty acids measured (one saturated, two monounsaturated and 12 polyunsaturated fatty acids) in eggs were correlated with their levels in the recent diet, and the rate of incorporation into eggs was proportional to the magnitude of the diet shift. Large shifts in diet might occur naturally during spawning migrations or when prey communities vary over time. Results of this study indicate that fatty acids in red drum eggs can be useful for studying adult diet and exploring trophic linkages in marine systems. This article is part of the theme issue ‘The next horizons for lipids as ‘trophic biomarkers': evidence and significance of consumer modification of dietary fatty acids'.

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