Journal article
Transcriptome Analysis of the Sydney Rock Oyster, Saccostrea glomerata: Insights into Molluscan Immunity
PLoS One, Vol.11(6), e0126649
2016
Abstract
Background: Oysters have important ecological functions in their natural environment, acting as global carbon sinks and improving water quality by removing excess nutrients from the water column. During their life-time oysters are exposed to a variety of pathogens that can cause severe mortality in a range of oyster species. Environmental stressors encountered in their habitat can increase the susceptibility of oysters to these pathogens and in general have been shown to impact on oyster immunity, making immune parameters expressed in these marine animals an important research topic. Results: Paired-end Illumina high throughput sequencing of six S. glomerata tissues exposed to different environmental stressors resulted in a total of 484,121,702 paired-end reads. When reads and assembled transcripts were compared to the C. gigas genome, an overall low level of similarity at the nucleotide level, but a relatively high similarity at the protein level was observed. Examination of the tissue expression pattern showed that some transcripts coding for cathepsins, heat shock proteins and antioxidant proteins were exclusively expressed in the haemolymph of S. glomerata, suggesting a role in innate immunity. Furthermore, analysis of the S. glomerata ORFs showed a wide range of genes potentially involved in innate immunity, from pattern recognition receptors, components of the Toll-like signalling and apoptosis pathways to a complex antioxidant defence mechanism. Conclusions: This is the first large scale RNA-Seq study carried out in S. glomerata, showing the complex network of innate immune components that exist in this species. The results confirmed that many of the innate immune system components observed in mammals are also conserved in oysters; however, some, such as the TLR adaptors MAL, TRIF and TRAM are either missing or have been modified significantly. The components identified in this study could help explain the oysters' natural resilience against pathogenic microorganisms encountered in their natural environment.
Details
- Title
- Transcriptome Analysis of the Sydney Rock Oyster, Saccostrea glomerata: Insights into Molluscan Immunity
- Authors
- Nicole G Ertl (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast - Faculty of Science, Health, Education and EngineeringWayne A O'Connor (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast - Faculty of Science, Health, Education and EngineeringAlexie Papanicolaou (Author) - CSIRO Ecosystem SciencesAaron Wiegand (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast - Faculty of Science, Health, Education and EngineeringAbigail Elizur (Author) - University of the Sunshine Coast - Faculty of Science, Health, Education and Engineering
- Publication details
- PLoS One, Vol.11(6), e0126649; 33
- Publisher
- Public Library of Science
- Date published
- 2016
- DOI
- 10.1371/journal.pone.0156649
- ISSN
- 1932-6203
- Copyright note
- Copyright © 2016 Ertl et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
- Organisation Unit
- School of Health - Biomedicine; School of Science and Engineering - Legacy; University of the Sunshine Coast, Queensland; GeneCology Research Centre - Legacy; School of Health and Sport Sciences - Legacy; School of Science, Technology and Engineering; Centre for Bioinnovation; School of Health and Behavioural Sciences - Legacy
- Language
- English
- Record Identifier
- 99449686202621
- Output Type
- Journal article
Metrics
35 File views/ downloads
604 Record Views
InCites Highlights
These are selected metrics from InCites Benchmarking & Analytics tool, related to this output
- Collaboration types
- Domestic collaboration
- Web Of Science research areas
- Immunology
UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
This output has contributed to the advancement of the following goals:
Source: InCites