Abstract

Brachymystax lenok (lenok) is a rare cold-water fish native to China that is of high meat quality. Its wild population has declined sharply in recent years, and therefore, exploring the molecular mechanisms underlying the development and reproduction of lenoks for the purposes of artificial breeding and genetic improvement is necessary. The lenok comparative transcriptome was analyzed by combining single molecule, real-time, and next generation sequencing (NGS) technology. Differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified in five tissues (head kidney, spleen, liver, muscle, and gonad) between immature [300 days post-hatching (dph)] and mature [three years post-hatching (ph)] lenoks. In total, 234,124 and 229,008 full-length non-chimeric reads were obtained from the immature and mature sequencing data, respectively. After NGS correction, 61,405 and 59,372 non-redundant transcripts were obtained for the expression level and pathway enrichment analyses, respectively. Compared with the mature group, 719 genes with significantly increased expression and 1,727 genes with significantly decreased expression in all five tissues were found in the immature group. Furthermore, DEGs and pathways involved in the endocrine system and gonadal development were identified, and p38 mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs) were identified as potentially regulating gonadal development in lenok. Inhibiting the activity of p38 MAPKs resulted in abnormal levels of gonadotropin-releasing hormone, follicle-stimulating hormone, and estradiol, and affected follicular development. The full-length transcriptome data obtained in this study may provide a valuable reference for the study of gene function, gene expression, and evolutionary relationships in B. lenok and may illustrate the basic regulatory mechanism of ovarian development in teleosts.

Highlights

  • Brachymystax lenok is an economically important fish in the Amur Basin with highquality nutrient-rich meat

  • To study the expression pattern of p38 mitogen-activated protein kinases (MAPKs) in lenok, the expression of p38 MAPK protein was detected in eight tissues of lenok, including the gill, heart, liver, spleen, intestine, brain, skin, and gonads (Figure 6A), and the results showed that the expression of p38 MAPK was higher in the intestine, heart, and brain tissues, but was not expressed in the gill and spleen

  • The results showed that the expression of p38 MAPK in the ovary significantly increased with the growth and development of lenok

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Summary

Introduction

Brachymystax lenok (lenok) is an economically important fish in the Amur Basin with highquality nutrient-rich meat. Full-length mRNA can be generated directly without assembly, and this technique has been successfully used for the full-length transcriptome analysis of multiple species, such as cattle [8], rabbits [9], mice [10], and shrimp [11]. It has been widely used in teleosts [12,13,14]

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