Project description:Integrated analysis of transcriptomics and metabolomics in Blunt Snout Bream. With the improvement of living standards, people’s demand for food nutrient is getting higher and higher. Fish is one kind of protein-rich food and is increasingly favored by consumers. It has been well recognized that flesh composition of fish is closely related to its maturation and growth stages, but few researches have explored these differences. Besides, hormone residues in fish after artificial inducing reproduction also attract consumers’ concern. In this study, we try to address these concerns by using a combination of transcriptomics and metabolomics analysis to identify the key pathways, genes, and metabolites regulation which may affect flesh nutrition of one typical aquaculture species in China, blunt snout bream (Megalobrama amblycephala).
Project description:<p>Aquafeed is one of the main costs in aquaculture and major efforts are being made to find sustainable ingredients that could improve production sustainability and efficiency. Our research focused on the inclusion of glycerol in the feed of European seabass (Dicentrarchus labrax), as it is a cheap carbon substrate expected to enter metabo- lism through the glycolytic pathway. The Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) spectroscopy provides accurate and high-throughput metabolic profiles, allowing quantification and evaluation of the effects of experimental diets in the context of fish nutrition. The aim of the present study was to assess the applicability of the automated on-line profiling routine Bayesil to fish blood plasma and compare with the manual targeted metabolite profiling approach. After a 60-day feeding trial (0%, 2.5%, 5.0% glycerol supplemented diets), fish were sacrificed at 6 h and 24 h after last meal and blood was sampled. Filtered plasma samples were analysed by NMR, followed by two metabolite-profiling approaches: i) an automated spectral profiling provided by the Bayesil platform, and ii) a manual metabolite profiling. Spectra were analysed with the automated Bayesil routine, identifying and quantifying 51 metabolites, in a reproducible, fast and user-independent method. On the other hand, the manual approach only managed to quantify 20 metabolites. However, under supraphysiological concentrations of glycerol, namely in the 5.0% diet, the Bayesil algorithm was not able to properly integrate the glycerol and glycine signals. The Bland-Altman and PLS-DA analysis revealed differences; nonetheless, with the exception of acetic acid, creatinine, formate, glutamine and threonine, all other metabolites presented a low bias and/or a strong correlation coefficient. Overall, it is expected a reasonable tradeoff between the accuracy in metabolite quantification and the increase of variables.The automated Bayesil database may be applied as a useful tool for systematic monitoring of fish plasma profile in aquaculture research and industrial quality control analysis, to generate robust variance-based multivariate statistical models. To our knowledge, this is the first time a NMR-based high-throughput automated routine is evaluated in aquaculture research.</p>
Project description:In the context of replacing fish meal and fish oil in feeds for aquaculture, rainbow trout alevins received from first-feeding onwards, one of the three experimental diets: V (100% plant-based), C (mix of FM-FO & plant ingredients) or M (100% FM-FO based). The long term effects of such dietary replacement on the intestinal (mid gut) and hepatic transcriptome were studied in juveniles after a 7-month feeding trial at 7°C.
Project description:N-3 long chain polyunsaturated fatty acids (n-3LC-PUFA) are essential components of vertebrate membrane lipids and are now at critically low levels in modern Western diets. The main human dietary source for n-3LC-PUFA is fish and seafood, and over 50% of global fish production is currently supplied by aquaculture. However, increasing pressure to include vegetable oils, which are devoid of n-3LC-PUFA, in aquaculture feeds reduces their content in farmed fish flesh. The aim of this investigation was to infer mechanisms determining flesh n-3LC-PUFA content in Atlantic salmon. The TRAITS / SGP Atlantic salmon 17k feature cDNA microarray (ArrayExpress accession: A-MEXP-1790) was used to compare hepatic mRNA expression in 8 families, reared under common conditions, which exhibited contrasting high and low flesh n-3LC-PUFA levels at harvest. The microarray interrogations incorporated a common pooled reference design, comprising a total of 16 hybridisations (8 families x 2 - dye swap). Each family sample comprised RNA pooled from six sibs.
Project description:Domestication of finfishes is a key element toward sustainable expansion of aquaculture sector. However, huge gap in knowledge on the mechanisms of adaptability of fish to the culture environment, being the first step toward successful domestication, exists. This affects the overall production capacity which is hindered, among others, by lowered reproductive capacity of domesticated stocks, including pikeperch – a highly valued commercial freshwater fish species. Transcriptomic profiling of embryos was found to be useful tool significantly contributing into understanding domestication process in aquaculture. Up to now there is no data on transcriptomic profiling of unfertilized eggs in any fish species as well as on pikeperch, in general. Using next generation sequencing the first complex transcriptome of pikeperch have been obtained (with 40,246 unique protein-coding genes). Next, specifically designed, pikeperch-specific microarrays (Agilent technologies) were developed (with 35,343 unique probes) and transcriptomic profiling of eggs coming from wild and domesticated populations (all characterized by high quality) was performed. From among 17,543 genes found to be expressed in eggs of pikeperch 710 were found to be differentially expressed. Functional, enrichment analysis revealed that the most enriched processes represented by the set of genes identified were developmental process, regulation of phosphorylation and nervous system development. The results of the present study provides a new insight into the processes being directly involved in the successful domestication of finfishes. It can be suggested that all the identified processes were pre-determined by the maternally derived set of genes contained already in the unfertilized eggs, what has never been reported to date. In addition to that, it has been shown for the first time that among the most important processes being affected by the domestication the post translation modifications of proteins along with development of the nervous system were identified. This allows to suggest that fish behavior should be considered as a very important trait for selection for aquaculture purposes in pikeperch.
Project description:The sustainable development of modern aquaculture must rely on a significant reduction of the fish meal (FM) used in aquafeed formulations. However, FM substitution with alternative ingredients in diets for carnivorous fish species often showed reduced nutrient absorption, significantly perturbed metabolisms and histological changes at both hepatic and intestinal level. In the present study, adult rainbow trout (Oncorhynchus mykiss) were fed three different experimental aquafeed formulations. A control diet with higher FM content (27.3%) than two test formulations in which fish meal was substituted with two more sustainable and promising alternatives: insect meal (Hermetia illucens larvae=10.1%, FM=11.6%) and poultry by-products meal (PBM=14.8%; FM=11.7%). Combined metabolomics and proteomics analyses of fish liver, together with histological examination of liver and intestine demonstrated that a well balanced formulation of nutrients in the three diets allowed high metabolic compatibility of either substitutions, paving the way for innovative and sustainable use of novel raw materials for the fish feed industry. Results show that the main metabolic pathways of nutrient absorption and catabolism were essentially unaltered by alternative feed ingredients, and also histological alterations were negligible. It is demonstrated that substitution of fish meal with sustainable alternatives does not impact on fish metabolism, given proper efforts are put in fulfilling nutritional requirements of rainbow trout.