Affiliation:
1. College of Marine Sciences, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
2. Laboratory of Aquatic Sciences, Key Laboratory of Animal Nutrition and Feed Science in South China of Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, Guangdong Key Laboratory of Animal Breeding and Nutrition, Institute of Animal Science, Guangdong Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Guangzhou 510640, China
3. Guangdong Province Engineering Research Centre of Aquatic Immunization and Aquaculture Health Techniques, South China Agricultural University, Guangzhou 510642, China
4. University Joint Laboratory of Guangdong Province, Hong Kong and Macao Region on Marine Bioresource Conservation and Exploitation, Guangzhou 510642, China
Abstract
Hypoxia is a common environmental stressor in aquatic ecosystems, and during the cultivation process, Megalobrama amblycephala is prone to death because it is hypoxia-intolerant, which brings huge economic losses to farmers. The pituitary gland is a crucial endocrine gland in fish, and it is mainly involved in the secretion, storage, and regulation of hormones. In the present study, we compared the transcriptional responses to serious hypoxia in the pituitary gland among hypoxia-sensitive (HS) and hypoxia-tolerant (HT) M. amblycephala and a control group that received a normal oxygen supply (C0). The fish were categorized according to the time required to lose balance during a hypoxia treatment. A total of 129,251,170 raw reads were obtained. After raw sequence filtering, 43,461,745, 42,609,567, and 42,730,282 clean reads were obtained for the HS, HT, and C0 groups, respectively. A transcriptomic comparison revealed 1234 genes that were differentially expressed in C0 vs. HS, while 1646 differentially expressed genes were obtained for C0 vs. HT. In addition, the results for HS vs. HT showed that 367 upregulated and 41 downregulated differentially expressed genes were obtained for a total of 408 differentially expressed genes. A KEGG analysis of C0 vs. HS, C0 vs. HT, and HS vs. HT identified 315, 322, and 219 enriched pathways, respectively. Similar hypoxia-induced transcription patterns suggested that the downregulated DEGs and enriched pathways were related to pathways of neurodegeneration in multiple diseases, pathways in cancer, thermogenesis, microRNAs in cancer, diabetic cardiomyopathy, and renin secretion. However, in the upregulated DEGs, the PI3K-Akt signaling pathway (C0 vs. HS), microRNAs in cancer (C0 vs. HT), and HIF-1 signaling pathway (HS vs. HT) were significantly enriched. There is a lack of clarity regarding the role of the pituitary gland in hypoxic stress. These results not only provide new insights into the mechanism by which pituitary tissue copes with hypoxia stress in M. amblycephala but also offer a basis for breeding M. amblycephala with hypoxia-resistant traits.
Funder
National Key R&D Program of China
Guangdong Academy of Agricultural Science Talent Program
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