Occurrence of paralytic shellfish poison (PSP) in bivalves, along with mossworm adherent to their shells, collected from Fukue Island, Nagasaki, Japan during 1995 and 1996

Thirty species of shellfish were collected at Fukue Island, Nagasaki Prefecture in July 1995 through October 1996, and screened for paralytic shellfish poison (PSP). Six species were found to be toxic: Pecten albicans (scallop), Chlamys farreri (scallop), Septifer virgatus (mussel), Pinna bicolor, Area boucardi and Pseudochama retroversa. In both scallops, the digestive gland was most toxic, with the highest score of 133.8 MU/g in P. albicans. The toxin profile of P. albicans featured the dominant presence of gonyautoxins (GTXs) in 1995. In 1996, however, low-toxicity components such as the C (PX) group were major, as was the case in the profile of C. farreri. In this connection, the mossworm adherent to shells of C. farreri contained a low level of PSP, whose major components were decarbamoyl GTX 2 (dcGTX2) and GTX2, along with dcGTX3 and GTX3, differing clearly from the components of C. farreri.