Abstract
Sex reversal is a complex biological phenomenon exhibited by Cynoglossus semilaevis. Some genetic females may irreversibly convert to pseudomales, thus increasing aquaculture costs because males grow much more slowly than females. In this study, an integrative analysis of transcriptome and proteome was performed to compare differences in gene and protein expression in females and pseudomales after gonad differentiation in C. semilaevis. Based on RNA-Seq results, 1893 genes showed differences in expression at the transcript level between females and pseudomales. Of these differentially expressed genes (DEGs), zona pellucida sperm-binding protein 4-like (LOC103393374 , ZP4), zona pellucida sperm-binding protein 4-like (LOC103396071, ZP4) and forkhead box L2 (foxl2) were highly expressed in females and doublesex and mab-3 related transcription factor 1(dmrt1) and doublesex and mab-3 related transcription factor 3 (dmrt3) were highly expressed in pseudomales. GO enrichment analysis results indicate that wnt signaling pathways and oocyte maturation are two terms enriched in female. At the protein level, Tandem Mass Tags analysis revealed that 324 proteins differed in their relative abundance between pseudomales and females. KEGG analysis found that pseudo-highly expressed proteins were enriched in the ubiquitin mediated proteolysis pathway. For integrative analysis, the Spearman correlation coefficient between the transcriptome and proteome was 0.59. Among 52 related genes, 46 DEGs (88%) were well matched in their levels of change in protein abundance. These findings reveal major active pathways in female and pseudomale gonads after sex reversal and provide new insights into molecular mechanisms associated with sex reversal regulatory network.
Highlights
Cynoglossus semilaevis is a valuable commercial fish and is distributed along the coast of the Yellow Sea and the Bohai Sea of China (Jiang & Li, 2017)
We identified two loci associated with sex reversal of C. semilaevis by genome-wide association study (GWAS)
Gene Ontology (GO) functional enrichment analysis was used to determine biological functions significantly associated with differentially expressed genes (DEGs) or Differentially expressed proteins (DEPs), including relevant molecular functions, cell components, and biological processes
Summary
Cynoglossus semilaevis is a valuable commercial fish and is distributed along the coast of the Yellow Sea and the Bohai Sea of China (Jiang & Li, 2017). The cost of breeding C. semilaevis has increased and increasing and maintaining the level of females in a population has become an urgent and important issue in C. semilaevis aquaculture. We identified two loci associated with sex reversal of C. semilaevis by genome-wide association study (GWAS). These two loci are located on the Z chromosome in the third intron of the F-box and leucine-rich repeat protein 17 (fbxl17 ) gene (Cyn_Z_6676874) and the third intron of the dmrt gene (Cyn_Z_8564889) (Jiang & Li, 2017; Cui et al, 2018). Genetic females that contain both the T allele of the Cyn_Z_6676874 locus and the A allele of the Cyn_Z_8564889 locus reverse into pseudomales and have provided scientific guidance for breeding and management of C. semilaevis aquaculture
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