Isobaric Tags for Relative and Absolute Quantitation-Based Proteomics Analysis Provides a New Perspective Into Unsynchronized Growth in Kuruma Shrimp (Marsupenaeus japonicus)

Jichen Zhao,Chengbo Sun,Yiyi Huang,Guoliang Chen,Yunqi Zhong,Zuotao Ni,Luyao Liu,Zexu Lin,Minze Liao

doi:10.3389/fmars.2021.761103

Abstract

Unsynchronized growth is a common phenomenon in farmed crustaceans. The underlying molecular mechanism of unsynchronized growth of crustaceans is unclear. In this study, a comparative proteomic analysis focusing on growth differences was performed using kuruma shrimp Marsupenaeus japonicus, an economic crustacean species, as the model. The study analyzed kuruma shrimp at fast growth stage and steady growth stage from both fast growth group and slow growth group by an Isobaric tags for relative and absolute quantitation (iTRAQ)-based quantitative proteomic analysis method. A total of 1,720 proteins, including 12,291 peptides, were identified. Fifty-two and 70 differentially expressed proteins (DEPs) were identified in the fast growth stage and steady growth stage, respectively. Interestingly, 10 DEPs, including 14-3-3-epsilon-like, GPI, GPD1, MHC-1a, and MHC-1b, were presented in both growth stages. In addition, all these 10 DEPs shared the same expression tendency at these two growth stages. The results indicated that these 10 DEPs are potential growth biomarkers of M. japonicus. Proteins associated with faster growth of M. japonicus may promote cell growth and inhibit cell apoptosis through the Hippo signaling pathway. The fast growth group of M. japonicus may also achieve growth superiority by activating multiple related metabolic pathways, including glycolysis, glycerophospholipid metabolism and Citrate cycle. The present study provides a new perspective to explore the molecular mechanism of unsynchronized growth in crustacean species.

Highlights

Growth rate is a key factor to associate with the yield and economic benefits for the crustacean farming industry
To obtain an overview of the M. japonicus proteome, protein samples were prepared from the fast growth group and slow
In the category of biological process, the largest number of proteins was assigned to the term cellular process, whereas the binding and cell subcategories contained the largest number of proteins in the categories of molecular function and cellular component, respectively

Summary

Introduction

Growth rate is a key factor to associate with the yield and economic benefits for the crustacean farming industry. For most crustacean species, the growth is unsynchronized, which means even cultured under the same genetic and environmental conditions (Ren et al, 2017; Jiang et al, 2020; Uengwetwanit et al, 2020), individual crustacean grows at different rates. There is limit information on the underlying mechanism of unsynchronized growth in crustaceans, which hinders the industry development. Gene expression regulation is a complex multilevel process In this process, genes are the carriers of genetic information (Cheng et al, 2018), and proteins are the executors of the physiological functions and direct manifestations of life activity (Zhang et al, 2014). Proteomics analysis focusing on expressed proteins, becomes an effective method to explore the molecular mechanisms corresponding to different phenotypes. A number of studies on crustaceans’ unsynchronized growth at the gene-level were observed (Lv et al, 2015; Uengwetwanit et al, 2020), there are few related studies focusing on protein identification and quantification (Ren et al, 2017)

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Discussion

Conclusion