Transcriptomic analysis of shell repair and biomineralization in the blue mussel, Mytilus edulis

BMC Genomics

Tejaswi Yarra¹  Melody S. Clark²  Kirti Ramesh³  Frank Melzner³  Anne Hüning³  Mark Blaxter⁴ 

[1] Ashworth Laboratories, University of Edinburgh, Institute of Evolutionary Biology, Charlotte Auerbach Road, EH9 3FL, Edinburgh, UK;British Antarctic Survey, Natural Environment Research Council, High Cross, Madingley Road, CB3 0ET, Cambridge, UK;British Antarctic Survey, Natural Environment Research Council, High Cross, Madingley Road, CB3 0ET, Cambridge, UK;GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research, 24105, Kiel, Germany;Sanger Institute, Wellcome Genome Campus, Hinxton, Cambridgeshire, CB10 1SA, Saffron Walden, UK;

关键词: Mollusc;    Bivalve;    Shell matrix proteins;    Haemocytes;    Calcium;   

DOI  :  10.1186/s12864-021-07751-7

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundBiomineralization by molluscs involves regulated deposition of calcium carbonate crystals within a protein framework to produce complex biocomposite structures. Effective biomineralization is a key trait for aquaculture, and animal resilience under future climate change. While many enzymes and structural proteins have been identified from the shell and in mantle tissue, understanding biomieralization is impeded by a lack of fundamental knowledge of the genes and pathways involved. In adult bivalves, shells are secreted by the mantle tissue during growth, maintenance and repair, with the repair process, in particular, amenable to experimental dissection at the transcriptomic level in individual animals.ResultsGene expression dynamics were explored in the adult blue mussel, Mytilus edulis, during experimentally induced shell repair, using the two valves of each animal as a matched treatment-control pair. Gene expression was assessed using high-resolution RNA-Seq against a de novo assembled database of functionally annotated transcripts. A large number of differentially expressed transcripts were identified in the repair process. Analysis focused on genes encoding proteins and domains identified in shell biology, using a new database of proteins and domains previously implicated in biomineralization in mussels and other molluscs. The genes implicated in repair included many otherwise novel transcripts that encoded proteins with domains found in other shell matrix proteins, as well as genes previously associated with primary shell formation in larvae. Genes with roles in intracellular signalling and maintenance of membrane resting potential were among the loci implicated in the repair process. While haemocytes have been proposed to be actively involved in repair, no evidence was found for this in the M. edulis data.ConclusionsThe shell repair experimental model and a newly developed shell protein domain database efficiently identified transcripts involved in M. edulis shell production. In particular, the matched pair analysis allowed factoring out of much of the inherent high level of variability between individual mussels. This snapshot of the damage repair process identified a large number of genes putatively involved in biomineralization from initial signalling, through calcium mobilization to shell construction, providing many novel transcripts for future in-depth functional analyses.

【 授权许可】

CC BY