Zhu Qihui, Qin Zeqian, Chen Ruiyi, Wang Ligai, Tan Peng, Xu Dongdong
Key Lab of Mariculture and Enhancement of Zhejiang Province, Zhejiang Marine Fisheries Research Institute, Zhoushan, China.
School of Fisheries, Zhejiang Ocean University, Zhoushan, China.
Front Genet. 2022 May 13;13:872815. doi: 10.3389/fgene.2022.872815. eCollection 2022.
The yellow drum () is one of the most important marine economic fish in China, and its sexually dimorphic growth makes it preferable for mono-sex culture. Although gynogenesis and neo-male induction techniques have been established, the molecular pathways and regulatory mechanisms of sex determination and maintenance in gynogenetic females and neo-males remains far from fully understood. In this study, the gene expression profiles were investigated in the gonads and brains of wild-type male, wild-type female, neo-male, and gynogenetic female yellow drum using comparative transcriptome analyses. Generally, a total of 52,999 novel transcripts were obtained in RNA-seq, of which 45,651 were isoforms of known protein-coding genes, 1,358 novel protein-coding genes, and 5,990 long non-coding RNAs. We found that the differences between wild-type males and neo-males and between wild-type females and gynogenetic females were relatively small at both the histological and transcriptomic levels, indicating that artificial gynogenesis or hormonal sex reversal may have minimal effects on normal female or male life function, respectively. In the brain, pathways such as "Oocyte meiosis", "Cell cycle", and "Riboflavin metabolism" were found to be significantly enriched. In the gonads, pathways such as "Prolactin signaling pathway", "PPAR signaling pathway", "Cholesterol metabolism", and "Jak-STAT signaling pathway" were found to play important roles in maintaining the regular proliferation and differentiation of females and males in yellow drum. In particular, we found that might be an effective molecular marker to differentiate between gynogenetic and normal females owing to its unique expression pattern. The results of this study may help to elucidate the molecular mechanisms involved in sex maintenance in the gonads and brain and provide basic data for genetic breeding of the yellow drum.
黄姑鱼是中国最重要的海洋经济鱼类之一，其雌雄生长异形使其更适合单性养殖。尽管已建立了雌核发育和新雄鱼诱导技术，但雌核发育雌鱼和新雄鱼的性别决定和维持的分子途径及调控机制仍远未完全清楚。在本研究中，利用比较转录组分析研究了野生型雄鱼、野生型雌鱼、新雄鱼和雌核发育雌鱼黄姑鱼的性腺和脑中的基因表达谱。一般来说，RNA测序共获得52,999条新转录本，其中45,651条是已知蛋白质编码基因的异构体，1,358条新蛋白质编码基因，以及5,990条长链非编码RNA。我们发现，在组织学和转录组水平上，野生型雄鱼与新雄鱼之间以及野生型雌鱼与雌核发育雌鱼之间的差异相对较小，这表明人工雌核发育或激素性逆转可能分别对正常雌鱼或雄鱼的生命功能影响最小。在脑中，发现“卵母细胞减数分裂”、“细胞周期”和“核黄素代谢”等途径显著富集。在性腺中，发现“催乳素信号通路”、“PPAR信号通路”、“胆固醇代谢”和“Jak-STAT信号通路”等途径在维持黄姑鱼雌雄性别的正常增殖和分化中起重要作用。特别是，我们发现 由于其独特的表达模式，可能是区分雌核发育雌鱼和正常雌鱼的有效分子标记。本研究结果可能有助于阐明性腺和脑中性别维持所涉及的分子机制，并为黄姑鱼的遗传育种提供基础数据。
