Factors Involved in the Formation of Amorphous and Crystalline Calcium Carbonate: A Study of an Ascidian Skeleton

Abstract

The majority of invertebrate skeletal tissues are composed of the most stable crystalline polymorphs of CaCO(3), calcite, and/or aragonite. Here we describe a composite skeletal tissue from an ascidian in which amorphous and crystalline calcium carbonate coexist in well-defined domains separated by an organic sheath. Each biogenic mineral phase has a characteristic Mg content (5.9 and 1.7 mol %, respectively) and concentration of intramineral proteins (0.05 and 0.01 wt %, respectively). Macromolecular extracts from various biogenic amorphous calcium carbonate (ACC) skeletons are typically glycoproteins, rich in glutamic acid and hydroxyamino acids. The proteins from the crystalline calcitic phases are aspartate-rich. Macromolecules extracted from biogenic ACC induced the formation of stabilized ACC and/or inhibited crystallization of calcite in vitro. The yield of the synthetic ACC was 15-20%. The presence of Mg facilitated the stabilization of ACC: the protein content in synthetic ACC was 0.12 wt % in the absence of Mg and 0.07 wt % in the presence of Mg (the Mg content in the precipitate was 8.5 mol %). In contrast, the macromolecules extracted from the calcitic layer induced the formation of calcite crystals with modified morphology similar to that expressed by the original biogenic calcite. We suggest that specialized macromolecules and magnesium ions may cooperate in the stabilization of intrinsically unstable amorphous calcium carbonate and in the formation of complex ACC/calcite tissues in vivo.