Hunan Provincial Key Laboratory of Animal Intestinal Function and Regulation, State Key Laboratory of Developmental Biology of Freshwater Fish, Hunan International Joint Laboratory of Animal Intestinal Ecology and Health, Hunan Normal University, Changsha 410081, China.
State Key Laboratory of Ecological Pest Control for Fujian and Taiwan Crops, Key Lab of Biopesticide and Chemical Biology, Ministry of Education, Institute of Biological Control, Fujian Agriculture and Forestry University, Fuzhou 350002, China.
G3 (Bethesda). 2022 Jul 29;12(8). doi: 10.1093/g3journal/jkac127.
Sexual dimorphism occurs widely throughout insects and has profound influences on evolutionary path. Sex-biased genes are considered to account for most of phenotypic differences between sexes. In order to explore the sex-biased genes potentially associated with sexual dimorphism and sexual development in Drosophila suzukii, a major devastating and invasive crop pest, we conducted whole-organism transcriptome profiling and sex-biased gene expression analysis on adults of both sexes. We identified transcripts of genes involved in several sex-specific physiological and functional processes, including transcripts involved in sex determination, reproduction, olfaction, and innate immune signals. A total of 11,360 differentially expressed genes were identified in the comparison, and 1,957 differentially expressed genes were female-biased and 4,231 differentially expressed genes were male-biased. The pathway predominantly enriched for differentially expressed genes was related to spliceosome, which might reflect the differences in the alternative splicing mechanism between males and females. Twenty-two sex determination and 16 sex-related reproduction genes were identified, and expression pattern analysis revealed that the majority of genes were differentially expressed between sexes. Additionally, the differences in sex-specific olfactory and immune processes were analyzed and the sex-biased expression of these genes may play important roles in pheromone and odor detection, and immune response. As a valuable dataset, our sex-specific transcriptomic data can significantly contribute to the fundamental elucidation of the molecular mechanisms of sexual dimorphism in fruit flies, and may provide candidate genes potentially useful for the development of genetic sexing strains, an important tool for sterile insect technique applications against this economically important species.
性二型广泛存在于昆虫中，对进化路径有深远影响。性偏向基因被认为是导致雌雄之间表型差异的主要原因。为了探索与性二型和性发育相关的潜在性偏向基因，我们对两种性别的成年果蝇进行了全器官转录组分析和性偏向基因表达分析。我们鉴定了涉及几个性别特异性生理和功能过程的基因转录本，包括性别决定、繁殖、嗅觉和先天免疫信号相关的转录本。在比较中，共鉴定出 11360 个差异表达基因，其中 1957 个基因偏向雌性，4231 个基因偏向雄性。差异表达基因主要富集的途径与剪接体有关，这可能反映了雌雄之间不同的剪接机制。鉴定出 22 个性别决定和 16 个与性别相关的繁殖基因，表达模式分析显示，大多数基因在性别间存在差异表达。此外，还分析了性别特异性嗅觉和免疫过程的差异，这些基因的性偏向表达可能在信息素和气味检测以及免疫反应中发挥重要作用。作为一个有价值的数据集，我们的性别特异性转录组数据可以为果蝇性二型的分子机制的基本阐明做出重要贡献，并为遗传性别鉴定品系的开发提供潜在有用的候选基因，遗传性别鉴定品系是一种重要的工具，可用于针对这一具有重要经济意义的物种的不育昆虫技术应用。
