Protein expression pattern of calcium-responsive transactivator in early postnatal and adult testes

Ana Du,Li Li,Zhaoshuang Jiao,Gaochun Zhu,He Li,Ting Peng

doi:10.1007/s00418-020-01942-1

Abstract

Calcium-responsive transactivator (CREST), a nuclear protein highly expressed in postmitotic neurons, is involved in the regulation of cell cycle, differentiation and dendritic development of neuronal cells. Its mRNA has been detected in the testis of adult rat, whilst its protein expression and distribution pattern in the testis remain to be elucidated. In this study, we examined the distribution of CREST in the adult testes of both rats and human as well as the expression pattern of CREST in the testes of postnatal developing rats. In the adult testes of both human and rats, immunohistochemical analysis revealed that CREST was selectively distributed in the mature Sertoli cells but not in the spermatogenic cells. In the testes of postnatal developmental rats, CREST was expressed not only in Sertoli cells but also in the gonocytes and spermatogenic cells at the initial stage of spermatogenic cell differentiation. CREST immunoreactivity continued to increase in Sertoli cells during differentiation, reaching its peak in adulthood. However, CREST immunostaining intensity dramatically decreased as the spermatogenic cells differentiate, disappearing in the post-differentiation stage. Furthermore, Brg1 and p300, two CREST-interacting proteins ubiquitously expressed in the body, are found to be colocalized with CREST in the spermatogenic epithelial cells including Sertoli cells. The unique expression pattern of CREST in developing testis suggests that CREST might play regulatory roles in the differentiation of spermatogenic epithelial cells. The Sertoli cell-specific expression of CREST in the adulthood hints that CREST might be a novel biomarker for the mature Sertoli cells.

Highlights

Calcium-responsive transactivator (CREST) is a nuclear protein with a high homology to synovial sarcoma translocation (SYT) proto-oncogene with 54% amino acid identity (Storlazzi et al 2003; Aizawa et al 2004)
Previous study with Northern blot and in situ hybridization analysis has indicated that CREST mRNA is widely expressed in various peripheral organs and tissues including the testis (Aizawa et al 2004); whereas, the expression of CREST at the protein level has only been detected in the brain and pancreas with Western blot and /or immunohistochemistry (Aizawa et al 2004; Men et al 2013)
We demonstrated for the first time CREST protein expression in the rat and human testis with immunohistochemical staining

Summary

Introduction

Calcium-responsive transactivator (CREST) is a nuclear protein with a high homology to synovial sarcoma translocation (SYT) proto-oncogene with 54% amino acid identity (Storlazzi et al 2003; Aizawa et al 2004). The characteristic pattern of CREST expression in the developing brain has been investigated. In the late embryonic rat brain, for instance, CREST is only expressed in the postmitotic neurons of the cortical plate, but not in the proliferating neurons (Aizawa et al 2004). CREST expression in the rat brain is high at birth and declines substantially throughout early postnatal development, but remains at medium to high levels in the adulthood. Such development-dependent expression of CREST in the nervous system is suggestive of its regulative function on neuronal.

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