Characterization of Ghrelin O-acyltransferase mRNA in channel catfish

Abstract

Food intake is regulated by the reaction between hypothalamic neurotransmitters and peripheral signals. Ghrelin, known as a hunger hormone, stimulates food intake. Ghrelin O-acyltransferase (GOAT) catalyzes the acylation of medium-chain fatty acids to ghrelin to modify ghrelin activity. GOAT is found in all vertebrates, including fish, and is critical for modifying the activity of ghrelin. We hypothesized that GOAT is critical for regulating food intake because it modifies the activity of ghrelin in channel catfish. However, very little is known about GOAT in channel catfish, including the tissue distribution of its mRNA. We identified the nucleotide sequence that corresponds to the GOAT mRNA in GenBank. The sequencing alignment analysis showed that the sequence similarity between channel catfish GOAT mRNA and those of other fish species was high (>65%) in the region that corresponded to the open reading frame of the channel catfish GOAT mRNA. Examination of the tissue distribution of GOAT mRNA, including the brain, liver, muscle, kidneys, spleen, heart, and small and large intestines, revealed that GOAT mRNA expression was detectable in the brain, small intestine, and muscles. We are currently verifying the results of tissue distribution analysis using quantitative real-time PCR. We are also examining the relationship between changes in food intake and the expression of GOAT mRNA in the brain and muscle using real-time PCR. This is the full abstract presented at the American Physiology Summit 2023 meeting and is only available in HTML format. There are no additional versions or additional content available for this abstract. Physiology was not involved in the peer review process.