and Exhibit Distinct and Overlapping Functions in Marking Muscle Satellite Cells and Muscle Repair in a Marine Teleost, .

and are members of the gene family which are essential for embryo and organ development. Both genes have been proved to be markers of muscle satellite cells and play key roles in the process of muscle growth and repair. Here, we identified two genes ( and ) and two genes ( and ) in a marine teleost, black rockfish (). Our results showed and marked distinct populations of muscle satellite cells, which originated from the multi-cell stage and somite stage, respectively. In addition, we constructed a muscle injury model to explore the function of these four genes during muscle repair. Hematoxylin-eosin (H-E) of injured muscle sections showed new-formed myofibers occurred at 16 days post-injury (dpi). ISH (in situ hybridization) analysis demonstrated that the expression level of and two genes increased gradually during 0-16 dpi and peaked at 16 dpi. Interestingly, showed no significant differences during the injury repair process, indicating that the satellite cells labeled by were not involved in muscle repair. These results imply that the muscle stem cell populations in teleosts are more complicated than in mammals. This lays the foundation for future studies on the molecular mechanism of indeterminant growth and muscle repair of large fish species.