Project name: Ictalurus furcatus

Description: Fish skin is a critical regulatory organ, serving not only as a physical barrier to pathogen entry, but also as a sophisticated integrator of aquatic environmental, social and nutritional cues through roles in immunity, osmoregulation, and endocrine signaling. Integral to the complexity of teleost skin is the mucus layer secreted by epidermal goblet cells. Pathogen invasion can disrupt this delicate homeostasis with profound impacts on signaling throughout the organism. Here, we investigated the transcriptional effects of virulent A. hydrophila infection in blue catfish skin, Ictalurus furcatus. We utilized an 8X60K Agilent microarray to examine gene expression profiles at critical early timepoints following challenge—2 h, 12 h, and 24 h. Expression of a total of 1,155 unique genes was significantly perturbed during at least one timepoint. We observed dysregulation of a number of genes involved in including antioxidant/apoptosis, cytoskeletal rearrangement, immune response, junctional/adhesion, and proteases. In particular, A. hydrophila infection rapidly altered a number potentially critical lectins, chemokines, interleukins, and other mucosal factors in a manner predicted to enhance its ability to adhere and invade the catfish host.Overall design: Two-condition experiment, control vs. infected skin. Biological replicates: 3 control replicates, 3 infected replicates.3 timepoints

Data type: Transcriptome or Gene expression

Sample scope: Multiisolate

Relevance: Agricultural

Last updated: 2012-11-26