School of Life Sciences and Biopharmaceutics, Guangdong Pharmaceutical University, Guangzhou, China; Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Biotechnology Drug Candidate Research, Guangdong Pharmaceutical University, Guangzhou, China.
School of Life Sciences and Biopharmaceutics, Guangdong Pharmaceutical University, Guangzhou, China.
Comp Biochem Physiol Part D Genomics Proteomics. 2023 Sep;47:101117. doi: 10.1016/j.cbd.2023.101117. Epub 2023 Aug 11.
The sea cucumber Holothuria leucospilota, a nutritive and commercial marine species, has a high protein and low lipid content. To date, the mechanisms underlying gender determination and differentiation in sea cucumbers remain unclear. Identifying gender-specific molecular markers is an effective method of revealing the genetic basis of gender determination and differentiation. The inability to distinguish between male and female individuals causes reproductive efficiency to decline in aquaculture. In this study, we used the gonads of the sea cucumber H. leucospilota as samples to conduct the experiment. The differentially abundant metabolites (DAMs) detected by liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry were enriched in pathways associated with prolactin metabolism, insulin metabolism, hypoxia-inducible factor-1 signaling, and calcium signaling. At the transcriptome level, Illumina sequencing was performed on H. leucospilota, demonstrating that gender-specific expression genes were enriched in the retinoic acid-inducible gene I-like receptor signaling pathway, C-type lectin receptor signaling pathway, alpha-linolenic acid metabolism, and ether lipid metabolism by the Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) analysis. By analyzing the common pathways between DAMs and differentially expressed genes, we found that gender-related genes of H. leucospilota were mostly enriched in the necroptosis pathway and the cysteine and methionine metabolism pathways. According to the common pathways, uch-sc1 and uch-sc2 are male-specific expression genes, and uch-sc3 and bhmt are female-specific expression genes at the mRNA level. These results provide information on gender differences in H. leucospilota.
海参 Holothuria leucospilota 是一种营养丰富且具有商业价值的海洋物种，其蛋白质含量高，脂肪含量低。迄今为止，海参性别决定和分化的机制仍不清楚。鉴定性别特异性分子标记是揭示性别决定和分化遗传基础的有效方法。在水产养殖中，无法区分雌雄个体导致繁殖效率下降。在本研究中，我们以海参 H. leucospilota 的性腺为样本进行实验。通过液相色谱-质谱检测到的差异丰度代谢物（DAMs）富集在与催乳素代谢、胰岛素代谢、缺氧诱导因子-1 信号和钙信号相关的途径中。在转录组水平上，对 H. leucospilota 进行了 Illumina 测序，结果表明性别特异性表达基因在视黄酸诱导基因 I 样受体信号通路、C 型凝集素受体信号通路、α-亚麻酸代谢和醚脂代谢中富集，通过京都基因与基因组百科全书（KEGG）分析。通过分析 DAMs 和差异表达基因之间的共同途径，我们发现 H. leucospilota 的性别相关基因主要富集在坏死性凋亡途径和半胱氨酸和蛋氨酸代谢途径中。根据共同途径，uch-sc1 和 uch-sc2 是雄性特异性表达基因，而 uch-sc3 和 bhmt 是雌性特异性表达基因，在 mRNA 水平上。这些结果为 H. leucospilota 的性别差异提供了信息。
