Abstract
Body color is an important economic and ecological trait in aquatic animals, which influence their economic values and determine the animal ability to survive in the marine environment. Red-colored Plectropomus leopardus is in high demand owing to its bright color and potential value for artificial breeding. High-throughput transcriptome sequencing and liquid chromatography tandem-mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) approaches were used to identify transcript and metabolic differences between black-colored and red-colored P. leopardus. Compared with the black-colored group, 218 and 181 differentially expressed genes were up- and down- regulated, respectively, in the red-colored group. 425 and 56 significantly different metabolites were identified in LC-MS positive and LC-MS negative ion models, respectively, between two colored groups. Based on the integrative analysis, the red-colored group exhibited greater carotenoid uptake, transport, and accumulation activity potential than those in the black-colored group and may consume more arachidonic acid for body color formation. The black-colored group showed greater melanin synthesis activity compared with the red-colored group. These results substantially improve the understanding of molecular and metabolic mechanisms underlying body color formation in P. leopardus and the potential of body color for the environment adaptation.
Highlights
Body coloration is one of the most diverse and remarkable phenotypes, with multiple adaptive functions, including species recognition, communication, thermoregulation, camouflage, photoreception, and selective mating (Jiang et al, 2014; Du et al, 2019)
Genes were mapped to the P. leopardus genome, and the average mapping rates for the red-colored and black-colored groups were 83.61 and 83.26%, respectively (Table 1)
Genes related to carotenoid uptake, transport, and accumulation, including lowdensity lipoproteins receptor adapter protein 1 (LDLRA), fatty acid transport protein (FATP), stearoyl-CoA desaturase (SCD), showed significantly higher expression levels in the red-colored group than in the black-colored group, indicating that carotenoid
Summary
Body coloration is one of the most diverse and remarkable phenotypes, with multiple adaptive functions, including species recognition, communication, thermoregulation, camouflage, photoreception, and selective mating (Jiang et al, 2014; Du et al, 2019). Other color-related pigments, such as red, yellow, and white pigments, have been evaluated in common carp (Jiang et al, 2014; Du et al, 2019), and Nothobranchius fish (Ng’Oma et al, 2014), researches about the specific molecular and metabolic mechanism of body color formation in fish are still limited. The leopard coral grouper (Plectropomus leopardus) naturally inhabits tropical and subtropical waters of the Indo-Pacific Oceans, and exhibits black and red body colors, which contribute to fish adaptation to environment, quality, and price (Maoka et al, 2017). Prices of red leopard coral grouper are significantly higher than those of the black fish, in Chinese markets which showed the different possibility for the environmental and economic values for different body color fishes. Transcriptome sequencing of different color morphs of P. leopardus has revealed multiple genes associated with carotenoid metabolism (Wang et al, 2015; Yang et al, 2020) and different kinds of carotenoids, including astaxanthin, tunaxanthin, and adonixanthin, were detected and participated in body color formation in P. leopardus (Maoka et al, 2017)
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