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Structural Characterization of the Transient Amorphous Calcium Carbonate Precursor Phase in Sea Urchin Embryos†

  1. Y. Politi1,
  2. Y. Levi-Kalisman2,
  3. S. Raz3,
  4. F. Wilt4,
  5. L. Addadi1,
  6. S. Weiner1,
  7. I. Sagi1

Article first published online: 10 MAY 2006

DOI: 10.1002/adfm.200600134

Issue

Advanced Functional Materials

Advanced Functional Materials

Volume 16, Issue 10, pages 1289–1298, July, 2006

Additional Information

How to Cite

Politi, Y., Levi-Kalisman, Y., Raz, S., Wilt, F., Addadi, L., Weiner, S. and Sagi, I. (2006), Structural Characterization of the Transient Amorphous Calcium Carbonate Precursor Phase in Sea Urchin Embryos. Adv. Funct. Mater., 16: 1289–1298. doi: 10.1002/adfm.200600134

Author Information

  1. 1

    Department of Structural Biology, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot 76100, Israel

  2. 2

    The Ilse Katz center for Meso- and Nanoscale Science and Technology, Ben-Gurion University, Beer-Sheva 84105, Israel

  3. 3

    Department of Chemical Physics, Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot 76100, Israel

  4. 4

    Department of Molecular and Cell Biology, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720-3200, USA

  1. †

    We thank Prof. Matthias Epple and Dr. Alexander Becker for their valuable assistance; Wolfgang Caliebe from the NSLS beam line X19 at BNL for providing technical support; Prof. Aldo Shemesh and Dr. Ruth Yam for the mass spectrometer determinations; and Prof. Muki Spiegel, Sharon Marziano, and Hamutal Krugoliac from the Israel Oceanographic and Limnological Research for providing fertile sea urchins. We thank the Kimmelman Center for Biomolecular Structure and Assembly, Weizmann Institute, for financial support. F. W. is grateful to support of the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation (USA). L. A. is the incumbent of the Dorothy and Patrick Gorman professorial chair of Biological Ultrastructure, and S. W. is the incumbent of the Dr. Walter and Dr. Trude Burchardt professorial chair of Structural Biology. I. S. is the incumbent of the Pontecorvo professorial chair of cancer research. Supporting Information is available online from Wiley InterScience or from the authors.

Publication History

  1. Issue published online: 26 JUN 2006
  2. Article first published online: 10 MAY 2006
  3. Manuscript Accepted: 17 MAR 2006
  4. Manuscript Received: 9 FEB 2006

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Keywords:

  • Biomineralization;
  • Calcium carbonate;
  • X-ray absorption spectroscopy

Abstract

Sea urchin embryos form their calcitic spicular skeletons via a transient precursor phase composed of amorphous calcium carbonate (ACC). Transition of ACC to calcite in whole larvae and isolated spicules during development has been monitored using X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS). Remarkably, the changing nature of the mineral phase can clearly be monitored in the whole embryo samples. More detailed analyses of isolated spicules at different stages of development using both XAS and infrared spectroscopy demonstrate that the short-range order of the transient ACC phase resembles calcite, even though infrared spectra show that the spicules are mostly composed of an amorphous mineral phase. The coordination sphere is at first distorted but soon adopts the octahedral symmetry typical of calcite. Long-range lattice rearrangement follows to form the calcite single crystal of the mature spicule. These studies demonstrate the feasibility of real-time monitoring of mineralized-tissue development using XAS, including the structural characterization of transient amorphous phases at the atomic level.

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