Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Center of Mental Health, University Hospital of Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany.
Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Center of Mental Health, University Hospital of Würzburg, Würzburg, Germany.
Gene Expr Patterns. 2020 Jun;36:119111. doi: 10.1016/j.gep.2020.119111. Epub 2020 Mar 18.
The glucose-fructose oxidoreductase domain containing gene family (GFOD) is small and contains only two members in human (GFOD1 and GFOD2). Information about its function is scarce. As the name implies the proteins contain an enzyme-defining domain, however, if this is functional and has enzymatic activity remains to be shown. A single nucleotide polymorphism situated in an intron of GFOD1 was found to be associated with inattentive symptomology in patients with attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. Further, in a large schizophrenia genome-wide association study the GFOD2 locus was found to be associated with the psychiatric condition. Until now, however, it is unclear what specific functions are associated with the two GFOD-family members, if they might be involved in neurodevelopment and how this may relate to the development of psychiatric disorders. In order to gain first insights into the hypothesis that GFOD-family members are involved in brain development and/or function we performed RNA in situ hybridization on zebrafish (Danio rerio) tissues at different developmental stages. We found that both family members are expressed in the central nervous system at embryonic, larvae and adult stages. We were able to define subtle differences of expression of the two gfod genes and we showed that a subset of GABAergic neurons express gfod1. Taken together, we conclude that both gfod gene family members are expressed in overlapping as well as in distinct regions in the zebrafish central nervous system. Our data suggest that gfod1 and gfod2 are relevant both for the developing and adult zebrafish brain. This study paves the way for further functional analyses of this yet unexplored gene family.
葡萄糖-果糖氧化还原酶结构域包含基因家族（GFOD）很小，人类中仅包含两个成员（GFOD1 和 GFOD2）。关于其功能的信息很少。顾名思义，这些蛋白质包含一个酶定义结构域，但是否具有功能和酶活性仍有待证明。在 GFOD1 的内含子中发现了一个单核苷酸多态性与注意力缺陷/多动障碍患者的注意力不集中症状有关。此外，在一项大型精神分裂症全基因组关联研究中，发现 GFOD2 基因座与精神状况有关。然而，到目前为止，尚不清楚与这两个 GFOD 家族成员相关的特定功能是什么，如果它们可能与神经发育有关，以及这与精神疾病的发展有何关系。为了深入了解 GFOD 家族成员是否参与大脑发育和/或功能的假说，我们在不同发育阶段的斑马鱼（Danio rerio）组织上进行了 RNA 原位杂交。我们发现这两个家族成员在胚胎期、幼虫期和成年期都在中枢神经系统中表达。我们能够确定这两个 gfod 基因的表达存在细微差异，并表明 GABA 能神经元亚群表达 gfod1。总之，我们得出结论，两个 gfod 基因家族成员在斑马鱼中枢神经系统中重叠和独特的区域表达。我们的数据表明，gfod1 和 gfod2 对于发育中和成年的斑马鱼大脑都是相关的。这项研究为进一步研究这个尚未探索的基因家族的功能铺平了道路。
