Magnetic resonance imaging as a means to assess the body growth and the gonad development of the oyster

To make a preliminary exploration of the possibilities and limits of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) for assessing body growth and gonad development of the Pacific oyster, Crassostrea gigas, individual monitoring was conducted on diploid and triploid oysters in their second year, maintained from February to October in a pond on the French Atlantic coast. Magnetic resonance imaging was done on each oyster on five dates during the study period. From these images, variations in the volumes of the flesh, digestive gland–gonad and adductor muscle, and the surface of the gills were measured over time. Apart from the well known differences between diploids and triploids related to maturation of gametes, other original observations of assessing growth were made from these MRI measurements using a non-invasive technique. The standard error of mean dry flesh variation was lower than that found by other commonly used measurement methods. A negative correlation was established between the volume of the gametes spawned and the increase in dry flesh volume after spawning. Moreover, these variations were correlated with the chemical composition of the adductor muscle. All these observations and conclusions need to be confirmed by further observations on oysters of different sizes or grown in different environments.