Flow cytometry and automatic blood cell analysis in striped bass Morone saxatilis (Walbaum, 1792): A new hematological approach

This research was carried out in order to compare two innovative analytical methods for the evaluation of bloodcells (white blood cells, WBC; red blood cells, RBC and thrombocytes, TC) in Striped bassMorone saxatilis(Walbaum, 1792). For this purpose, the automatic blood cell count and theflow cytometry analysis were em-ployed to analyze blood samples of 20 adult specimens ofM. saxatilis, bred in a recirculating aquaculture system(RAS) of afish farm located in Acate (Ragusa, Sicily, Italy). Statistical analysis of the data has shown a significantpositive correlation between the two analytical methods only for WBC (r= 0.95) and RBC (r= 0.97). No sig-nificant correlation was found for TC (r=−0.18).This study aims to contribute to the knowledge on blood cell analysis with reliable automatic methods ap-plicable in aquaculture which represent an important and useful tool for the diagnosis offish diseases.