The saltiness of the sea breaks DNA in marine invertebrates: possible implications for animal evolution

Abstract

More than 97 percent of the world's water is ocean and its average osmolality of 1000 mosmol/kg is much higher than the 300 mosmol/kg found in most of the intercellular fluids of vertebrates. Many marine invertebrates are osmoconformers, meaning that the osmolality of their extracellular fluid is the same as that of seawater. We report here that marine invertebrates from diverse phyla have numerous DNA breaks in their cells while they are exposed to normal seawater containing high NaCl, but that the DNA breaks decrease or disappear when the animals are acclimated to the same water diluted to 300 mosmol/kg. We speculate that, since DNA breaks cause mutations, salinity might have important background effects on the rate and course of evolution.