Research Project Individual Post #1

In this experiment, we are comparatively analyzing 6 muscle protein samples from various marine species that have been electrophoresed in a polyacrylamide gel.

We chose to use several mollusk species and one arthropod species from which to gather muscle tissue to produce our protein samples. The mollusk species we used were octopus, squid, mussel, oyster, and scallop and we used a wild-caught shrimp for the outgroup arthropod species. In preparing our samples, we took into consideration which species were physiologically similar and which muscle groups between those species were similar. For instance, we chose to use tentacle muscle tissue from the cephalopod species and we chose to use adductor muscle tissue from the three bivalve species.

A reason to choose similar muscle tissue from the similar species is so analysis of their similarities and differences is more straightforward. A good example of this is the similarities between adductor muscles in bivalves, of which “38-48% of myofibrils are paramyosin”(). When analyzing the electrophoresed and stained gel, this similarity can be used to distinguish between the bivalves and the other species. Similar relationships can be observed between the cephalopod species, which can then be exploited in a same fashion during analysis.

Kantha S, Watabe S, Hashimoto K. Comparative Biochemistry of Paramyosin—A review. University of Tokyo. 1989 Aug. Re