The aim of the present research was to investigate the expression profiles of GnRH-R and neuropeptide Y (NPY) genes in brain and pituitary of Orange-spotted Grouper, Epinephelus coioides and also to understand the regulatory mechanism by administering different sex steroids. GnRH-R (TMD2 to TMD6) was partially involved cloned in this study. Tissue distribution analysis revealed a significant expression of GnRH-R in pituitary compared to others tissues. The expression of GnRH-R in brain and pituitary of groupers at different ages showed a significant increased during the fourth year, probably indicating the time of maturation. However, there was no significant difference in the expression of GnRH-R during different seasons. Treatment of two and three year old groupers with different sex steroids revealed an increase in the expression of GnRH-R in pituitary by E2 in both the age groups tested, while T could induce the expression of GnRH-R only in three year old groupers. The result, thus, indicates that the sensitivity of grouper to sex steroid is dependent on the age and the kind of steroid adminstered. In different sections of brain, the GnRH-R expression was in general lower in the group treated with E2 or T compared to the control group. The expression of the gene was more or less the same in two year and three year old control groups. This result may have been caused by suppression of GnRH-R expression in forebrain and midbrain after sex steroid injection. Administration of T induced a significant increase in the expression of GnRH-R in forebrain and midbrain, while E2 treatment did not have a similar effect. In hindbrain, the expression profile GnRH-R was not affected by sex steroid treatment in both two year and three year old groupers. The results suggest that sex steroids can only regulate the expression of GnRH-R in the forebrain and midbrain, probably due to the wide distribution of steroid¡¦s receptor in these regions. LHRH and pimozide injections to two year old groupers showed an increase in the expression of GnRH-R in pituitary after LHRH treatment while there was no stimulatory effect on other sections of the brain. In contrast, treating the fish with pimozide alone or pimozide together with LHRH did not stimulate GnRH-R expression in brain. Thus, the study suggests that LHRH can significantly increase the expression of GnRH-R in pituitary while dopamine has no stimulatory effect.
Studies on NPY showed that the gene was distributed in different sections of brain especially in the forebrain but it was also present in gills, liver, intestine ¡K etc. The presence of NPY in gills, though less compared to that in brain, suggests that NPY might play an important role in osmosis regulation. The expression of NPY decreased with increase in age which may be due to the effect of other regulatory factors. Treatment of two and three year old groupers with different sex steroids did not effect the expression of NPY significantly in brain, which is different from other published reports. This may be due to the difference in the zoning of brain regions. In the present study, forebrain and midbrain were sampled together for analyses. The expression of NPY in brain did not change by treating the fish with LHRH or pimozide.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:NSYSU/oai:NSYSU:etd-0204105-014342 |
| Date | 04 February 2005 |
| Creators | Wu, Chung-lin |
| Contributors | Li-lian Liu, Yan-hong Li, Cheng-chi Kao, Wen-shiun Yueh, Ching-fong Chang |
| Publisher | NSYSU |
| Source Sets | NSYSU Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Archive |
| Language | Cholon |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.lib.nsysu.edu.tw/ETD-db/ETD-search/view_etd?URN=etd-0204105-014342 |
| Rights | off_campus_withheld, Copyright information available at source archive |
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