Abstract
Crustaceans (decapods, isopods and amphipods) are recent colonists of land and range from amphibious to terrestrial species. The majority of terrestrial crustaceans, like their aquatic ancestors, have retained ammonotely. Amphibious species periodically return to standing pools of water to excrete ammonia, via the gills. In more terrestrial species, ammonia is eliminated in either an excretory fluid such as urine or P or volatilised as a gas. Due to the potential toxicity of ammonia, waste nitrogen is stored as transaminated amino acids such as glutamate, glutamine and glycine, between excretory bouts. Only one species, Birgus latro is known to be primarily purinotelic, producing a white faecal pellet of guanine and uric acid. Numerous terrestrial isopod and decapod crustaceans do, however, possess solid purine deposits of urate which are stored intracellularly within spongy connective tissue cells. The urate is synthesised de novo from excess dietary nitrogen. The deposits have been suggested to function as either storage excretion or to act as a temporary nitrogen store. In decapod crustaceans, there is substantial evidence against the temporary nitrogen store hypothesis since the urate is not degraded and utilised during negative nitrogen balance or during situations of high nitrogen demand such as oogenesis and moulting. Indeed it appears that herbivorous gecarcinid land crabs do not require a nitrogen store since they can meet their nitrogen requirements from a leaf litter diet. The location of the uricolytic enzymes in decapods suggests that the urate deposits may represent long-term storage of nitrogenous wastes. In isopods, the urate appears not to function as either a nitrogen store or storage excretion of nitrogenous wastes. In this group, it could act as a cation store during dehydration or as an antioxidant to prevent oxidative tissue damage. However, conditions which induce urate catabolism have yet to be conclusively demonstrated.
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Linton, S.M., Wright, J.C., Howe, C.G. (2017). Nitrogenous Waste Metabolism Within Terrestrial Crustacea, with Special Reference to Purine Deposits and Their Metabolism. In: Weihrauch, D., O’Donnell, M. (eds) Acid-Base Balance and Nitrogen Excretion in Invertebrates. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-39617-0_2
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