Concentration and preliminary characterization of a chemical attractant of the oyster drill,Urosalpinx cinerea.

Predatory muricid gastropods,Urosalpinx cinerea, respond to specific chemical stimuli by creeping upcurrent. Attractant substances originate from living barnacles. Newly hatched snails have no prior predatory experience but respond strongly to attractants. We report here methods for rapidly extracting and desalting attractants from seawater. Attractants from living barnacles are relatively large, at least partially proteinaceous, heat-stable molecules (> 1000 but < 10000 dallons) that adsorb onto Amberlite XAD-7, a polyacrylate water purification resin, at neutral pH. Attractants remain adsorbed to the resin during a wash with deionized water and can be eluted in a small volume with 100% methanol. Attractant substances are effective in the bioassay in μg/liter concentrations (octa- to nanomolar range). Potency is destroyed by nonspecific proteases (carboxy-peptidase and pronase) but not by trypsin. Attractant is not sequestered within barnacles.