RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 An ancient truncated duplication of the anti-Mullerian hormone receptor type 2 gene is a potential conserved master sex determinant in the Pangasiidae catfish family
JF bioRxiv
FD Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory
SP 2022.01.14.475871
DO 10.1101/2022.01.14.475871
A1 Ming Wen
A1 Qiaowei Pan
A1 Elodie Jouanno
A1 Jerome Montfort
A1 Margot Zahm
A1 Cédric Cabau
A1 Christophe Klopp
A1 Carole Iampietro
A1 Céline Roques
A1 Olivier Bouchez
A1 Adrien Castinel
A1 Cécile Donnadieu
A1 Hugues Parrinello
A1 Charles Poncet
A1 Elodie Belmonte
A1 Véronique Gautier
A1 Jean-Christophe Avarre
A1 Remi Dugue
A1 Rudhy Gustiano
A1 Trần Thị Thúy Hà
A1 Marc Campet
A1 Kednapat Sriphairoj
A1 Josiane Ribolli
A1 Fernanda L. de Almeida
A1 Thomas Desvignes
A1 John H. Postlethwait
A1 Christabel Floi Bucao
A1 Marc Robinson-Rechavi
A1 Julien Bobe
A1 Amaury Herpin
A1 Yann Guiguen
YR 2022
UL http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2022/01/15/2022.01.14.475871.abstract
AB The evolution of sex determination (SD) mechanisms in teleost fishes is amazingly dynamic, as reflected by the variety of different master sex-determining genes identified, even sometimes among closely related species. Pangasiids are a group of economically important catfishes in many South-Asian countries, but little is known about their sex determination system. Here, we generated novel genomic resources for 12 Pangasiid species and provided a first characterization of their SD system. Based on an Oxford Nanopore long-read chromosome-scale high quality genome assembly of the striped catfish Pangasianodon hypophthalmus, we identified a duplication of the anti-Müllerian hormone receptor type II gene (amhr2), which was further characterized as being sex-linked in males and expressed only in testicular samples. These first results point to a male-specific duplication on the Y chromosome (amhr2by) of the autosomal amhr2a. Sequence annotation revealed that the P. hypophthalmus Amhr2by is truncated in its N-terminal domain, lacking the cysteine-rich extracellular part of the receptor that is crucial for ligand binding, suggesting a potential route for its neofunctionalization. Short-read genome sequencing and reference-guided assembly of 11 additional Pangasiid species, along with sex-linkage studies, revealed that this truncated amhr2by duplication is also conserved as a male-specific gene in many Pangasiids. Reconstructions of the amhr2 phylogeny suggested that amhr2by arose from an ancient duplication / insertion event at the root of the Siluroidei radiation that is dated around 100 million years ago. Altogether these results bring multiple lines of evidence supporting that amhr2by is an ancient and conserved master sex-determining gene in Pangasiid catfishes, a finding that highlights the recurrent usage of the transforming growth factor β pathway in teleost sex determination and brings another empirical case towards the understanding of the dynamics or stability of sex determination systems.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.