Could a diet enriched with n-3 highly unsaturated fatty acids be considered a promising way to enhance the immune defences and the resistance ofPenaeidprawns to environmental stress?

Abstract

The prawn Penaeus stylirostris (Stimpson), when fed for 28 days with n-3 highly unsaturated fatty acid (HUFA)-enriched feed pellets, demonstrated an enhanced resistance to variations in environmental parameters (a decrease in temperature and salinity over a 4-day period from 28°C to 17°C and from 35½ to 10½ respectively) and an improvement in their immune defence potential, i.e. increased agglutination titre of plasma and increased respiratory burst of haemocytes.

Feeding n 3 HUFA enriched Artemia to the larvae of the pink shrimp Farfantepenaeus paulensis increases stress tolerance and subsequent growth

“…All this confirms the superior ability of the animals fed n-3 HUFA enriched Artemia to cope with adverse environmental conditions. Similar to the present findings, Tackaert et al (1989) and Immanuel et al (2007) verified that P. monodon postlarvae fed n-3 HUFA enriched Artemia had higher survival when exposed to a range of salinity levels in comparison to postlarvae fed unenriched Artemia, while Chim et al (2001) demonstrated that feeding higher n-3 HUFA levels increased the cellular membrane Table 1. Mean values (± SE) of the main fatty acids (% area) in Artemia enriched with a commercial emulsion containing over 400 mg g-1 of n-3 highly unsaturated fatty acids (EG) and newly hatched Artemia nauplii (CG).…”

“…Furthermore, shrimp fed n-3 HUFA rich diets have larger gill area , which concurs with the more ramified gill structure reported in n-3 HUFA fed P. monodon postlarvae (Rees et al, 1994). Although stress tests have been commonly used as a tool to compare the quality of crustacean larvae and juveniles in terms of tolerance to a number of physical and chemical parameters (Tackaert et al, 1989;Samocha et al, 1998;Cavalli et al, 2000;Chim et al, 2001;Álvarez et al, 2004;Martins et al, 2006;Immanuel et al, 2007;Sui et al, 2007), to date few studies have attempted to correlate the results of stress tests with the posterior growth performance of shrimp. In this regard, Bauman & Jamandre (1990) reported that batches of P. monodon postlarvae that responded positively to a salinity stress test presented a comparatively superior growout performance in ponds.…”

“…It is therefore recognized that penaeids fed n-3 HUFA deficient diets generally express a low tolerance to stress (Chim et al, 2001;Palacios & Racotta, 2007). In the present study, comparison of the salinity (LS50) and ammonia tolerance (LC50) of 8 dayold postlarvae fed enriched or newly hatched Artemia indicated pronounced differences.…”

“…A positive effect of the provision of dietary n-3 HUFA to crustaceans is that it often results in higher stress tolerance (Tackaert et al, 1989;Dhert et al, 1992;Rees et al, 1994;Cavalli et al, 2000;Chim et al, 2001;Palacios et al, 2004;Immanuel et al, 2007;Sui et al, 2007). It is therefore recognized that penaeids fed n-3 HUFA deficient diets generally express a low tolerance to stress (Chim et al, 2001;Palacios & Racotta, 2007).…”

“…Since Artemia is a nonselective filter feeding organism, enhancement of n-3 HUFA levels is achieved through enrichment techniques, by which n-3 HUFA rich compounds are provided to Artemia and consequently increase their nutritional value (Sorgeloos et al, 1998;Wouters et al, 2009). Previous studies have shown that feeding n-3 HUFA rich diets results in improved survival, growth andor stress tolerance of several crustacean species (Tackaert et al, 1989;Rees et al, 1994;Cavalli et al, 2000;Chim et al, 2001;Martins et al, 2006;Immanuel et al, 2007;Sui et al, 2007;Jinbo et al, 2013). Nonetheless, few studies have considered the effects of the nutritional quality of larviculture diets on further shrimp performance.…”