Molecular cloning and responsive expression to injury stimulus of a defender against cell death 1 (DAD1) gene from bay scallops Argopecten irradians

Apoptosis is an active process of cell death, which is an integral part of growth and development in multicellular organisms. The defender against cell death 1 (DAD1), the regulatory protein to inhibit the apoptosis process, was first cloned from the bay scallop Argopecten irradians by randomly sequencing a whole tissue cDNA library and rapid amplification of cDNA end (RACE). The full-length cDNA of the A. irradians DAD1 was 607 bp, consist of a 5'-terminal untranslated region (UTR) of 63 bp, a 3'-terminal UTR of 205 bp with a canonical polyadenylation signal sequence AATAAA and a poly (A) tail, and an open reading frame of 339 bp. The deduced amino acid sequence of the A. irradians DAD1 showed 75.5% identity to Araneus ventricosus, 74.5% to Drosophila melanogaster, and 73.6% to Homo sapiens, Sus scrofa, Mesocricetus auratus, Rattus norvegicus and Mus musculus. Excluding the Saccharomyces cerevisiae DAD1 homologue, all animal DAD1 including A. irradians DAD1 homologue formed a subgroup and all plant DAD1 proteins formed another subgroup in the phylogenetic analysis. The A. irradians DAD1 was expressed in all examined tissues including adductor muscle, mantle, gills, digestive gland, gonad and hemolymph, suggesting that A. irradians DAD1 is expressed in most body tissues. Furthermore, the mRNA expression levels of A. irradians DAD1 gene of hemolymph were particularly high after injury, suggesting that the gene is responsive to injury stimuli.

栉孔扇贝C型凝集素-2(CfLec-2)基因的克隆和分析

栉孔扇贝是我国北方一种重要的贝类养殖品种。自1997年以来爆发的栉孔扇贝大规模死亡，给地区经济造成了重大损失并且已经严重威胁着扇贝养殖业的健康发展。然而，到目前为止，对扇贝免疫防御分子机理的了解还很少，深入研究扇贝免疫应答的分子机制是认识和了解病害发生和实现病害控制的重要途径。本研究采用了EST大规模测序和3’RACE的方法，从栉孔扇贝cDNA文库中克隆到一个凝集素基因CfLec-2，并对功能进行了研究。 CfLec-2 cDNA全长708bp，5’非翻译区(Untranslated Region, UTR)含有59bp，3’非翻译区含有163bp，具有典型的多聚腺苷酸加尾信号序列AATAAA和多聚腺苷酸尾巴，开放阅读框(Open Reading Frame, ORF )含有486bp，编码162个氨基酸残基，该多肽的理论分子量为16.8 kDa，等电点为4.54。利用SignalP分析，发现其信号肽的剪切位置在VEA-QSL之间。经BLASTP比对分析可知，CfLec-2基因编码的蛋白与人的Brevican，Anguilla japonica的C-type lectin-1和C-type lectin-2， Rattus norvegicus的CD23有较高的相似性，其中与Brevican的一致性有37%。Clustal W多序列比对发现该多肽具有标准长型C型凝集素所必须的6个保守半胱氨酸和相对保守的糖识别位点。用SMART(Small Modular Architecture Research Tool)软件分析发现其具有一个保守的糖识别结构域(Carbohydrate-recognition Domain, CRD)，氨基酸序列上第49、125、141、149位置上的半胱氨酸参与形成糖识别结构域，而位于N末端的第21和32位上的两个半胱胺酸形成额外的一个二硫键，位于115、116和117上的Glu、Pro、Asp则构成了糖识别位点。 将编码CfLec-2成熟肽段的cDNA序列克隆进pET32a(+)载体中，并在大肠杆菌Rosetta-gami(DE3)中重组表达CfLec-2。重组蛋白利用其具有的His tag纯化并复性后发现CfLec-2可以凝集溶血葡萄球菌，且凝集过程不需要钙离子的参与。并且，CfLec-2对大肠杆菌TOP10F’有微弱的抑菌活性，对溶壁微球菌、溶血葡萄球菌和鳗弧菌则没有抑菌活性。这一结果说明，CfLec-2可能不仅参与对入侵微生物的识别过程，而且可能作为效应分子起到了直接杀灭入侵微生物的作用。 本研究发现CfLec-2具有和以前在栉孔扇贝报道的CFLec-1完全不同的功 能，说明栉孔扇贝利用不同的凝集素来识别不同的病原，同时也暗示栉孔扇贝中可能有更多不同功能的凝集素有待发现。研究结果丰富和发展了海水无脊椎动物免疫学的内容，对进一步了解扇贝固有免疫的机制，实现养殖扇贝疾病防治具有重要参考价值。

Postnatal development of the retina in root vole Microtus oeconomus

Vision plays an important role in the living habits of animals, especially in feeding. We investigated the postnatal development of retina in root vole Microtus oeconornus. The result shows that the retina of the M. oeconornus is very primitive before postnatal day （PD） 3. The neuroblastic layer does not differentiate and makes up more than half of the retina layer. The outer plexiform layer （OPL） first comes into existence at PDS. At PD6, as the presence of the OPL becomes obvious, the outer nuclear layer （ONL） and inner nuclear layer （INL） are much clearer. At PD18, the retina is similar to an adult retina and each layer becomes distinct. The thickness and cell density of the ganglion cell layer （GCL） and ONL during different postnatal days were also examined. These results show that the thickness and density of ONL increase during ontogeny, while the thickness and density of GCL decrease. Compared with Rattus norvegicus, Apodemus agrarius , Cricetulus triton, Microtus mandarinus , Myospalax cansus , Spermophilus dauricus and Sciurotamias davidianus, the histological structure of the retina of M. oeconornus is between that of nocturnal and diurnal rodents.

高原鼠兔种群的性比

性比是反映动物种群的基本特征之一，因此成为种群生态学的主要研究内容。就种群的性比而言，在不同的物种、或同一物种在不同的时期和条件下都有极大的不同~[1-4]。性比的改变将影响动物的种群结构、家庭组成和交配关系，也影响动物两性的配偶竞争、繁殖投入、繁殖成功以及性二型的分化等~[4-13]。在繁殖过程中，动物可以采用改变性比的方法调节种群的密度和大小[2,14,15]。同时，动物的性比受多种因素的影响，不仅存在季节、年间以及地理变化的差异，而且受环境条件(如气温和降水量)的影响~[2～4]。捕食风险也是影响性比的主要因素。虽然许多动物出生时的性比是一样的，但是，由于捕食者在捕食猎物的过程中存在明显的选择性，使其性比发生了明显的变化~[16]。对于动物种群性比的研究已有诸多报道，其研究的动物包括海蛇尾(Ophiactis savignyi)~[5]、龙虾(Homarus gam- marus)~[6]、射毒蛙(Dendrobates purnilio)~[9]、斑马雀(Taeniopygyia guttata castanotis)~[8]、褐家鼠(Rattus norvegicus)~[17]等。高原鼠兔(Ochotona curzoniae)是青藏高原草地生态系统中的优势小哺乳类动物。有关高原鼠兔种群性比的研究，国内学者有过涉及~[18,19]，但所作工作多是在高原鼠兔繁殖生态学研究中进行的静态描述，对种群性比的年龄变化，季节和年度变化及其与环境条件的关系等方面的研究尚缺详细的报道。本文通过对高原鼠兔种群性比的年间比较、不同胎次性比的分析和越冬对其性比影响的研究，旨在探讨高原鼠兔的性比变化在其种群调节中的作用。

cDNA cloning and overexpression of acidic ribosomal phosphoprotein P1 gene (RPLP1) from the Giant Panda

RPLP1 is one of acidic ribosomal phosphoproteins encoded by RPLP1 gene, which plays an important role in the elongation step of protein synthesis. The cDNA of RPLP1 was cloned successfully for the first time from the Giant Panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) using RT-PCR technology, which was also sequenced, analyzed preliminarily and expressed in E. coli. The cDNA fragment cloned is 449bp in size, containing an open reading frame of 344bp encoding 114 amino acids. Alignment analysis indicated that the nucleotide sequence and the deduced amino acid sequence are highly conserved to other five species studied, including Homo sapiens, Mus musculus, Rattus norvegicus, Bos Taurus and Sus scrofa. The homologies for nucleotide sequences of Giant Panda PPLP1 to that of these species are 92.4%, 89.8%, 89.0%, 91.3% and 87.5%, while the homologies for amino acid sequences are 96.5%, 94.7%, 95.6%, 96.5% and 88.6%. Topology prediction showed there are three Casein kinase II phosphorylation sites and two N-myristoylation sites in the RPLP1 protein of the Giant Panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca). The RPLP1 gene was overexpressed in E. coli and the result indicated that RPLP1 fusion with the N-terminally His-tagged form gave rise to the accumulation of an expected 18kDa polypeptide, which was in accordance with the predicted protein and could also be used to purify the protein and study its function.

Molecular phylogeny and taxonomy of wood mice (genus Apodemus Kaup, 1829) based on complete mtDNA cytochrome b sequences, with emphasis on Chinese species

Phylogenetic relationships among 15 species of wood mice (genus Apodemus) were reconstructed to explore some long-standing taxonomic problems. The results provided support for the monophyly of the genus Apodemus, but could not reject the hypothesis of paraphyly for this genus. Our data divided the 15 species into four major groups: (1) the Sylvaemus group (A. sylvaticus, A. flavicollis, A. alpicola, and A. uralensis), (2) the Apodemus group (A. peninsulae, A. chevreri, A. agrarius, A. speciosus, A. draco, A. ilex, A. semotus, A. latronum, and A. mystacinus), (3) A. argenteus, and (4) A. gurkha. Our results also suggested that orestes should be a valid subspecies of A. draco rather than an independent species; in contrast, A. ilex from Yunnan may be regarded as a separate species rather than a synonym of orestes or draco. The species level status of A. latronum, tscherga as synonyms of A. uralensis, and A. chevrieri as a valid species and the closest sibling species of A. agrarius were further corroborated by our data. Applying a molecular clock with the divergences of Mus and Rattus set at 12 million years ago (Mya) as a calibration point, it was estimated that five old lineages (A. mystacinus and four major groups above) diverged in the late Miocene (7.82-12.74 Mya). Then the Apodemus group (excluding A. mystacinus) split into two subgroups: agrarius and draco, at about 7.17-9.95 Mya. Four species of the Sylvaemus group were estimated to diverge at about 2.92-5.21 Mya. The Hengduan Mountains Region was hypothesized to have played important roles in Apodemus evolutionary histories since the Pleistocene. (C) 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.