Histologia da lagosta verde (Panulirus laevicauda)

Abstract

Lobsters of the genus, Panulirus are among the most socially and economically important fishing species on the Brazilian coast. Lobster fishing in Brazil covers a large part of the coast, occurring in the North and Northeast regions, and reaching the state of Espírito Santo. Signs of overexploitation of lobsters, whether red lobster (P. argus) or green lobster (P. laevicauda), are already observed, as they are the most commercially exploited. It is important to point out that, despite the strong signs of overfishing, the fishing effort continues to grow, with few mitigating actions such as closing, considered inefficient. Furthermore, knowledge about these organisms still has relevant gaps. For example, there is little information about the populations of Ceará in relation to the occurrence of illnesses. However, for the development of these studies, an essential tool for the monitoring of diseases would be a catalog of the healthy histology of the target species. For P. laevicauda there is no systematic description of normal histology to date, which limits the scope of histopathological study initiatives. The objective of the present work is to use classical histology methods to describe and characterize healthy gills, hepatopancreas, antennal gland, heart, gonads and muscle tissue of green lobster. To achieve this objective, samples were taken with the fishing industry and the main fishing landing ports in the state. A detailed description of the identified tissues was then developed in order to establish a pattern that can be used for histopathological analysis of the species P. laevicauda and to serve as reference material for specimens of lobster in general, since most previous work show tissues from diseased organisms.