Impact of metal pollution on shrimp Crangon affinis by NMR-based metabolomics

• YRE and LZB are mainly polluted by Cd and As, respectively.
• Metal pollutions caused differential effects in C. affinis from different sites.
• Metabolomics is useful to elucidate metal pollution-induced biological effects.

Both cadmium and arsenic are the important metal/metalloid pollutants in the Bohai Sea. In this work, we sampled the dominant species, shrimp Crangon affinis, from three sites, the Middle of the Bohai Sea (MBS), the Yellow River Estuary (YRE) and the Laizhou Bay (LZB) along the Bohai Sea. The concentrations of metals/metalloids in shrimps C. affinis indicated that the YRE site was polluted by Cd and Pb, while the LZB site was contaminated by As. The metabolic differences between shrimps C. affinis from the reference site (MBS) and metal-pollution sites (YRE and LZB) were characterized using NMR-based metabolomics. Results indicated that the metal pollutions in YRE and LZB induced disturbances in osmotic regulation and energy metabolism via different metabolic pathways. In addition, a combination of alanine and arginine might be the biomarker of Cd contamination, while BCAAs and tyrosine could be the biomarkers of arsenic contamination in C. affinis.