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''Penaeus monodon'', commonly known as the giant tiger prawn, Asian tiger shrimp, black tiger shrimp, and other names, is a marine
crustacean Crustaceans (Crustacea, ) form a large, diverse arthropod taxon which includes such animals as decapods, seed shrimp, branchiopods, fish lice, krill, remipedes, isopods, barnacles, copepods, amphipods and mantis shrimp. The crustacean group can ...
that is widely reared for food.


Taxonomy

''Penaeus monodon'' was first described by
Johan Christian Fabricius Johan Christian Fabricius (7 January 1745 – 3 March 1808) was a Danish zoologist, specialising in "Insecta", which at that time included all arthropods: insects, arachnids, crustaceans and others. He was a student of Carl Linnaeus, and is co ...
in 1798. That name was overlooked for a long time, until 1949 when
Lipke Holthuis Lipke Bijdeley Holthuis (21 April 1921 – 7 March 2008) was a Dutch carcinologist, considered one of the "undisputed greats" of carcinology, and "the greatest carcinologist of our time". Holthuis was born in Probolinggo, East Java and obtained ...
clarified to which species it referred. Holthuis also showed that ''P. monodon'' had to be the
type species In zoological nomenclature, a type species (''species typica'') is the species name with which the name of a genus or subgenus is considered to be permanently taxonomically associated, i.e., the species that contains the biological type specime ...
of the genus ''
Penaeus ''Penaeus'' is a genus of prawns, including the giant tiger prawn (''P. monodon''), the most important species of farmed crustacean worldwide. The genus has been reorganised following a proposition of Pérez Farfante and Kensley based on morph ...
''.


Description

Females can reach about long, but are typically long and weigh ; males are slightly smaller at long and weighing . The carapace and abdomen are transversely banded with alternative red and white. The antennae are grayish brown. Brown pereiopods and pleopods are present with fringing setae in red.


Distribution

Its natural distribution is the Indo-Pacific, ranging from the eastern coast of
Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...
and the Arabian Peninsula, as far as
Southeast Asia Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical south-eastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of mainlan ...
, the
Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the contin ...
, and northern Australia. It is an invasive species in the northern waters of the
Gulf of Mexico The Gulf of Mexico ( es, Golfo de México) is an ocean basin and a marginal sea of the Atlantic Ocean, largely surrounded by the North American continent. It is bounded on the northeast, north and northwest by the Gulf Coast of the United ...
and the Atlantic Ocean off the Southern U.S.


Invasive species

The first occurrence of ''P. monodon'' in the U.S. was in November 1988. Close to 300 shrimp were captured off the Southeastern shore after an accidental release from an aquaculture facility. This species can now be caught in waters from Texas to North Carolina. Although ''P. monodon'' has been an invasive species for many years, it has yet to grow large established populations.Knott, D.M., P.L. Fuller, A.J. Benson, and M.E. Neilson, 2019, ''Penaeus monodon'': U.S. Geological Survey, Nonindigenous Aquatic Species Database, Gainesville, FL Escapes in other parts of the world, though, have led to established ''P. monodon'' populations, such as off West Africa, Brazil, and the Caribbean.


Habitat

''P. monodon'' is suited to inhabit a multitude of environments.Motoh, H. (1985). Biology and ecology of Penaeus monodon. In Taki Y., Primavera J. H. and Llobrera J. A. (Eds.). Proceedings of the First International Conference on the Culture of Penaeid Prawns/Shrimps, 4-7 December 1984, Iloilo City, Philippines (pp. 27-36). Iloilo City, Philippines: Aquaculture Department, Southeast Asian Fisheries Development Center. They mainly occur in Southeastern Asia, but are widely found. Juveniles of ''P. monodon'' are generally found in sandy estuaries and mangroves, and upon adulthood, they move to deeper waters (0- 110 meters) and live on muddy or rocky bottoms.FAO-FIRA, 2010. "Giant Tiger Prawn Home" (On-line). Accessed April 15, 2019 at http://affris.org/giant_tiger_prawn/overview.php The ''P. monodon'' has shown to be nocturnal in the wild, burrowing into substrate during the day, and coming out at night to feed.Cultured Aquatic Species Information Programme. Penaeus monodon. Cultured Aquatic Species Information Programme. Text by Kongkeo, H. In: ''FAO Fisheries and Aquaculture Department'' nline Rome. Updated 29 July 2005. ited 15 April 2019 ''P. monodon'' typically feed on detritus,
polychaete Polychaeta () is a paraphyletic class of generally marine annelid worms, commonly called bristle worms or polychaetes (). Each body segment has a pair of fleshy protrusions called parapodia that bear many bristles, called chaetae, which are made ...
worms, mollusks, and small crustaceans. They feed on algae, as well. Due to their nutrient-rich diet, these shrimp are unable to consume phytoplankton because of their feeding appendages, but they are able to consume senescent phytoplankton. They also commence mating at night, and can produce around 800,000 eggs.


Aquaculture

''P. monodon'' is the second-most widely cultured prawn species in the world, after only
whiteleg shrimp Whiteleg shrimp (''Litopenaeus vannamei'', synonym ''Penaeus vannamei''), also known as Pacific white shrimp or King prawn, is a species of prawn of the eastern Pacific Ocean commonly caught or farmed for food. Description ''L. vannamei'' grows ...
, ''Litopenaeus vannamei''. In 2009, 770,000
tonne The tonne ( or ; symbol: t) is a unit of mass equal to 1000  kilograms. It is a non-SI unit accepted for use with SI. It is also referred to as a metric ton to distinguish it from the non-metric units of the short ton ( United State ...
s were produced, with a total value of US$3,650,000,000. ''P. monodon'' makes up nearly 50% of cultured shrimp alone. The prawn is popular to culture because of its tolerance to salinity and very quick growth rate. However, they are very vulnerable to fungal, viral, and bacterial infections. Diseases such as white spot disease and
yellowhead disease Yellowhead disease (YHD) is a viral infection of shrimp and prawn, in particular of the giant tiger prawn (''Penaeus monodon''), one of the two major species of farmed shrimp. The disease is caused by the ''Yellow head virus'' (YHV), a positive- ...
have led to a great economic impact in shrimp industries around the globe. They can receive transmitted diseases from other crustaceans such as the Australian red claw crayfish (''Cherax quadricarinatus''), which is susceptible to yellowhead disease and has shown to transmit it to ''P. monodon'' in Thailand. Since black tiger shrimp are susceptible to many diseases, this engenders economic constraints towards the black tiger shrimp food industry in Australia, which is farm-raised. To confront such challenges, attempts have been made to selectively breed specific pathogen-resistant lines of black tiger shrimp. ''P. monodon'' has been farmed throughout the world, including areas such as West Africa, Hawaii, Tahiti, and England. For optimal growth, ''P. monodon'' is raised in waters between 28 and 33°C. Characteristically for the ''Penaeus'' genus, ''P. monodon'' has a natural ability to survive and grow in a wide range of salinity, though its optimal salinity is around 15-25 ppt. While in a farm setting, the shrimp are typically fed a compound diet, which is produced in dried pellets. By mixing the diet to have compound feeds and fresh feed, ''P. monodon'' was shown to have better reproductive performance.


Sustainable consumption

In 2010, Greenpeace added ''P. monodon'' to its seafood red list – "a list of fish that are commonly sold in supermarkets around the world, and which have a very high risk of being sourced from unsustainable fisheries". The reasons given by Greenpeace were "destruction of vast areas of mangroves in several countries, overfishing of juvenile shrimp from the wild to supply farms, and significant human-rights abuses".


Basic research

In an effort to understand whether
DNA repair DNA repair is a collection of processes by which a cell identifies and corrects damage to the DNA molecules that encode its genome. In human cells, both normal metabolic activities and environmental factors such as radiation can cause DNA da ...
processes can protect
crustacean Crustaceans (Crustacea, ) form a large, diverse arthropod taxon which includes such animals as decapods, seed shrimp, branchiopods, fish lice, krill, remipedes, isopods, barnacles, copepods, amphipods and mantis shrimp. The crustacean group can ...
s against infection, basic research was conducted to elucidate the repair mechanisms used by ''P. monodon''. Repair of DNA double-strand breaks was found to be predominantly carried out by accurate
homologous recombination Homologous recombination is a type of genetic recombination in which genetic information is exchanged between two similar or identical molecules of double-stranded or single-stranded nucleic acids (usually DNA as in cellular organisms but may ...
al repair. Another, less accurate process,
microhomology-mediated end joining Microhomology-mediated end joining (MMEJ), also known as alternative nonhomologous end-joining (Alt-NHEJ) is one of the pathways for repairing double-strand breaks in DNA. As reviewed by McVey and Lee, the foremost distinguishing property of MMEJ ...
, is also used to repair such breaks.


See also

*''
Macrobrachium rosenbergii ''Macrobrachium rosenbergii'', also known as the giant river prawn or giant freshwater prawn, is a commercially important species of palaemonid freshwater prawn. It is found throughout the tropical and subtropical areas of the Indo-Pacific reg ...
'', the giant freshwater prawn


References

{{Taxonbar, from=Q578204 Penaeidae Edible crustaceans Commercial crustaceans Crustaceans described in 1798 Taxa named by Johan Christian Fabricius