Quantitative expression of shell matrix protein genes and their correlations with shell traits in the pearl oyster Pinctada fucata》.pdf

Aquaculture 314 (2011) 73–79 Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Aquaculture jour nal homepage: www. / locate/aqua-online Quantitative expression of shell matrix protein genes and their correlations with shell traits in the pearl oyster Pinctada fucata Lijuan Zhang a,b, Maoxian He a,⁎ a Key Laboratory of Marine Bio-resources Sustainable Utilization, South China Sea Institute of Oceanology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 164 West Xingang Road, Guangzhou 510301, China b Graduate University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, China a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t Article history: Shell matrix proteins play an important role in the regulation of shell growth and formation in the pearl Received 31 July 2010 oyster, Pinctada fucata. This study compared the expression levels of seven shell matrix protein genes (aspein, Received in revised form 8 January 2011 prismalin-14 , n16, n19, nacrein, msi7, and efcbp) in pearl oysters of various sizes [large (L), medium (M), and Accepted 26 January 2011 small (S)] and analyzed the correlations between expression level and shell size. Except for efcbp and msi7, Available online 1 February 2011 significant correlations were detected between the expression levels of matrix protein genes and shell size: n19 expression displayed a negative correlation (P b 0.01) with increasing shell size, whereas expression levels Keywords: Real-