is one of the candidate genes that play essential roles in the elongation of the seahorse prehensile tail.

UNLABELLED

Seahorses are a hallmark of specialized morphological features due to their elongated prehensile tail. However, the underlying genomic grounds of seahorse tail development remain elusive. Herein, we evaluated the roles of essential genes from the gene family for the tail developmental process in the lined seahorse (). Comparative genomic analysis revealed that the gene family is conserved in seahorses. The expression profiles and in situ hybridization suggested that , , and may participate in seahorse tail development. Like in other teleosts, and were found to regulate the development of the tail axial mesoderm and tail somitic mesoderm, respectively. However, a significantly extended expression period of during seahorse tail development was observed. Signaling pathway analysis further showed that up-regulated the expression of the tail axial mesoderm gene (), while interaction analysis indicated that could promote the expression of . In summary, our results indicate that the special extended expression period of might promote caudal tail axis formation, which contributes to the formation of the elongated tail of the seahorse.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s42995-021-00099-7.