Hypoxia tolerance of giant-axon-mediated escape jetting in California market squid (Doryteuthis opalescens)

Squids display a wide range of swimming behaviors, including powerful escape-jets mediated by the giant axon system. For California market squid (Doryteuthis opalescens), maintaining essential behaviors like the escape response during environmental variations poses a major challenge since this species often encounters intrusions of cold, hypoxic offshore waters in its coastal spawning habitats. To explore the effects of hypoxia on locomotion and underlying neural mechanisms, we made in vivo recordings of giant axon activity and simultaneous pressure inside the mantle cavity during escape jets in squid exposed to acute progressive hypoxia followed by return to normal dissolved oxygen (DO) concentration (normoxia). Compared to normoxia (>8 mg L−1 DO), escape jets were unchanged in moderate hypoxia (4 mg L−1 and 2 mg L−1 DO), but giant axon activity and associated mantle contractions significantly decreased while neuromuscular latency increased under severe hypoxia (0.5 mg L−1 DO). Animals that survived exposure to severe hypoxia reliably produced escape jets under such conditions and fully recovered as more oxygen became available. The reduction in neuromuscular output under hypoxia suggests that market squid may suppress metabolic activity to maintain sufficient behavioral output, a common strategy in many hypoxia-tolerant species. The ability to recover from the deleterious effects of hypoxia suggests that this species is well adapted to cope with coastal hypoxic events that commonly occur in Monterey Bay, unless these events become more severe in the future as climate change progresses.