A comprehensive transcriptome provides candidate genes for sex determination/differentiation and SSR/SNP markers in yellow catfish.

Sex dimorphic growth pattern has significant theory and application implications in fish. Recently, a Y- and X-specific allele marker-assisted sex control technique has been developed for mass production of all-male population in yellow catfish (Pelteobagrus fulvidraco), but the genetic information for sex determination and sex control breeding has remained unclear. Here, we attempted to provide the first insight into a comprehensive transcriptome covering multiple tissues from XX females, XY males, and YY super-males of yellow catfish by using 454 GS-FLX platform, for a better assembly and gene coverage. A total of 1,202,933 high quality reads (about 540 Mbp) were obtained and assembled into 28,297 contigs and 141,951 singletons. BLASTX searches against the NCBI non-redundant protein database (nr) led a total of 52,564 unique sequences including 18,748 contigs and 33,816 singletons to match 25,669 known or predicted unique proteins. All of them with annotated function were categorized by gene ontology (GO) analysis, and 712 were assigned to reproduction and reproductive process. Some potential genes relevant to reproductive system including steroid hormone biosynthesis and GnRH (gonadotropin-releasing hormone) signaling pathway were further identified by Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) analysis; and at least 21 sex determination and differentiation-related genes, such as Dmrt1, Sox9a/b, Cyp19b, WT1, and AMH were identified and characterized. Additionally, a total of 82,794 simple sequence repeats (SSRs), 26,450 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), and 4,145 insertions and deletions (INDELs) were revealed from the transcriptome data. Therefore, the current transcriptome resources highlight further studies on sex-control breeding in yellow catfish and will benefit future studies on reproduction and sex determination in teleost fish.