How the Antarctic Icefish lost its Red Blood cells and lived to tell the tale

Hemoglobin (Hb) transports oxygen from the respiratory organs to the rest of the body and is vital for all vertebrate life. It is Hb that gives vertebrate blood a red color. All vertebrates have Hb, except one group of Icefish. Icefishes as their common name suggests live in very cold environments. The Icefish is made up of 16 species from the Family Channicthyidae, within the suborder Notothenidae and reside in the Southern Ocean, which encircles Antartica.

White Blood!

Credit: Sidell B. et al (2006) Journal of Experiemental Biology 209:1792

Red blood from a Hb carrying Nototheniod fish (left) and white blood from an Hb-less Icefish (right)

It is not uncommon for fish in very deep and cold sea environments to have a decrease in Hb content due to an evolutionary response to the cold temperatures.
Credit: Marrabbio2, Wikimedia Commons

How was Hemoglobin Lost ?

Crocodile Icefish

A decrease in Hb is due to a down-regulation, a process that results in decrease gene expression.

Loss of Hb, Mb, erthrocytes

Decline of Hb effinity for oxygen Very low Hb Multiplicity Biosynthesis of antifreeze glycoproteins

Icefish lost Hb due to a large scale gene deletion, an accident, which could have left them extinct

Credit: C.H. et al (2009), Life 61: 185 Modified by Rebecca Noah

Phylogenetic tree depicts relationships between Notothenioid families and numbers indicate the number of species in each family

Contrary to logic Hb deletion does not persist because of some adaptive advantage. Instead of reducing the viscosity of blood and thus energy expenditures, Icefishes actually expend more energy on cardiovascular work. Loss of Hb is a disadaptive trait.

Is the Loss of Hemoglobin Advantageous?

22% of resting metabolic rate in icefishes is devoted to cardiac work, compared to a max of 5% in other fish species!

Then how do they survive?!

The perfect combination of environmental and physiological characteristics: !! Evolved with little to no niche or resource Credit: Sidell B. et al (2006) Journal of Experiemental Biology 209:1797 competition Physiological characteristics such as !! Occupy the coldest greater vascular tissue reduces the and most thermally diffusion distance for oxygen resulting in stable environment, greater oxygenation. The figure above is temperatures are the Retinal vasculature of an Hb nearly constant at expressing nototheniid (A) and a Hb-1.9 C lacking icefish (B). !! Cold water is oxygen rich