Gene expression analyses of the ovaries in black tiger shrimp (Penaeus monodon) for reproductive trait using reference genome

Abstract

The black tiger shrimp (Penaeus monodon) is widely cultured in Vietnam and worldwide. Broodstock source for post-larval production still relies on the wild shrimps due to their higher reproductive quality in comparison with the domesticated broodstock. The aims of the current study were to analyse differential gene expression in the ovaries of black tiger shrimp between the stages of reproductive maturation using the reference genome-based approaches and to compare the results generated by these approaches. cDNAs of the ovarian samples were sequenced using the Illumina platform. Genome-guided assembly (GGA) was employed to generate 71,678 contigs with an N50 length of 1,587 bp. For gene expression analysis, the newly built-transcriptome-based approach identified a total number of 288 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) when the samples between the non-mature and mature stages were compared. The gene expression analysis using the reference mapping approach resulted in only 49 DEGs. The analyses indicated that many genes involved in the reproductive maturation were up-regulated, including vitellogenin, NADH dehydrogenase subunit 2, and anti-lipopolysaccharide factor-like. Different results of gene expression from both approaches are discussed.