Department of Life Sciences, Università degli Studi di Trieste, Via Licio Giorgieri 5, 34127 Trieste, Italy.
Department of Biology and Evolution of Marine Organisms, Stazione Zoologica Anton Dohrn, Villa Comunale, 80121 Naples, Italy.
Int J Mol Sci. 2024 Jul 18;25(14):7846. doi: 10.3390/ijms25147846.
The urochordate exhibits numerous functional and morphogenetic traits that are shared with vertebrate models. While prior investigations have identified several analogies between the gastrointestinal tract (i.e., gut) of and mice, the molecular mechanisms responsible for these similarities remain poorly understood. This study seeks to address this knowledge gap by investigating the transcriptional landscape of the adult stage gut. Through comparative genomics analyses, we identified several evolutionarily conserved components of signaling pathways of pivotal importance for gut development (such as WNT, Notch, and TGFβ-BMP) and further evaluated their expression in three distinct sections of the gastrointestinal tract by RNA-seq. Despite the presence of lineage-specific gene gains, losses, and often unclear orthology relationships, the investigated pathways were characterized by well-conserved molecular machinery, with most components being expressed at significant levels throughout the entire intestinal tract of . We also showed significant differences in the transcriptional landscape of the stomach and intestinal tract, which were much less pronounced between the proximal and distal portions of the intestine. This study confirms that is a reliable model system for comparative studies, supporting the use of ascidians as a model to study gut physiology.
尾索动物表现出许多与脊椎动物模型共享的功能和形态发生特征。虽然先前的研究已经确定了 和小鼠的胃肠道（即肠道）之间存在几种相似之处，但这些相似之处的分子机制仍知之甚少。本研究旨在通过研究成年肠道的转录组图谱来填补这一知识空白。通过比较基因组学分析，我们鉴定出了几个对肠道发育至关重要的信号通路的进化保守成分（如 WNT、Notch 和 TGFβ-BMP），并通过 RNA-seq 进一步评估了它们在胃肠道的三个不同部位的表达。尽管存在谱系特异性基因增益、缺失，以及通常不明确的同源关系，但研究的通路具有高度保守的分子机制，大多数成分在 的整个肠道中都以显著水平表达。我们还显示了胃和肠道的转录组图谱存在显著差异，而在肠道的近端和远端之间差异则不那么明显。这项研究证实 是一个可靠的比较研究模型系统，支持将尾索动物作为研究肠道生理学的模型。
