Improvement of skeletal muscle growth by GH/IGF growth-axis contributes to growth performance in commercial fleshy sturgeon

Abstract

As the most trait of commercial fish, increasing the growth rate of skeletal muscle is of great significance to aquaculture industry. However, the regulation of growth hormone/somatomedin (GH/IGF) growth-axis on skeletal muscle has not been effectively applied for many years, and its effect on fish and production significance for aquaculture need to be further studied. This study investigated the regulatory mechanism in sturgeon development and combined multiple organ transcriptomics revealed some common pathways emerged in the developed sturgeon including “Cytokine-cytokine receptor interaction”, “Focal adhesion”, and “Arginine and Proline Metabolism”, while many specific pathways have also been enriched in each organ. Further, all annotated GH/IGF growth-axis related genes were higher in 12 months post-fertilized sturgeon than in 24 months one, showing the potential regulation of GH/IGF growth-axis in sturgeon growth. Besides, we found that our developed hybrid F1 sturgeons with Acipenser baeri♀ and Acipenser schrenckii♂ were highly expressed in downstream of GH/IGF growth-axis than that of A. schrenckii F1 and obviously higher than A. baeri F1. The hybrid F1 with high GH/IGF growth-axis expression and high myofiber diameter also has higher growth performance. The implementation of this study proved the promotion of GH/IGF growth-axis gene on sturgeon growth, which provided a target for further development of commercial fleshy varieties in the future.