Department of Biological Sciences, University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba, R3T 2N2, Canada.
Department of Biomedical Informatics, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, 02115, USA.
Commun Biol. 2022 May 10;5(1):434. doi: 10.1038/s42003-022-03375-z.
Sea lamprey undergo programmed genome rearrangement (PGR) in which ∼20% of the genome is jettisoned from somatic cells during embryogenesis. Although the role of PGR in embryonic development has been studied, the role of the germline-specific region (GSR) in gonad development is unknown. We analysed RNA-sequence data from 28 sea lamprey gonads sampled across life-history stages, generated a genome-guided de novo superTranscriptome with annotations, and identified germline-specific genes (GSGs). Overall, we identified 638 GSGs that are enriched for reproductive processes and exhibit 36x greater odds of being expressed in testes than ovaries. Next, while 55% of the GSGs have putative somatic paralogs, the somatic paralogs are not differentially expressed between sexes. Further, putative orthologs of some the male-biased GSGs have known functions in sex determination or differentiation in other vertebrates. We conclude that the GSR of sea lamprey plays an important role in testicular differentiation and potentially sex determination.
海七鳃鳗在胚胎发生过程中会经历程序性基因组重排（PGR），大约 20%的基因组会从体细胞中丢弃。尽管 PGR 在胚胎发育中的作用已经被研究过，但生殖系特异性区域（GSR）在性腺发育中的作用尚不清楚。我们分析了 28 个海七鳃鳗性腺在整个生命周期阶段采集的 RNA-seq 数据，生成了一个具有注释的基因组指导的 de novo 超转录组，并鉴定了生殖系特异性基因（GSGs）。总的来说，我们鉴定了 638 个 GSGs，这些基因富集了生殖过程，并在睾丸中表达的可能性比卵巢高 36 倍。接下来，虽然 55%的 GSGs 有假定的体细胞同源物，但这些体细胞同源物在性别之间没有差异表达。此外，一些雄性偏向的 GSGs 的假定直系同源物在其他脊椎动物的性别决定或分化中具有已知的功能。我们得出结论，海七鳃鳗的 GSR 在睾丸分化和潜在的性别决定中发挥重要作用。
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