Bmp Suppression in Mangrove Killifish Embryos Causes a Split in the Body Axis

Abstract

Bone morphogenetic proteins (Bmp) are major players in the formation of the vertebrate body plan due to their crucial role in patterning of the dorsal-ventral (DV) axis. Despite the highly conserved nature of Bmp signalling in vertebrates, the consequences of changing this pathway can be species-specific. Here, we report that Bmp plays an important role in epiboly, yolk syncytial layer (YSL) movements, and anterior-posterior (AP) axis formation in embryos of the self-fertilizing mangrove killifish, Kryptolebias marmoratus. Stage and dose specific exposures of embryos to the Bmp inhibitor dorsomorphin (DM) produced three distinctive morphologies, with the most extreme condition creating the splitbody phenotype, characterised by an extremely short AP axis where the neural tube, somites, and notochord were bilaterally split. In addition, parts of caudal neural tissues were separated from the main body and formed cell islands in the posterior region of the embryo. This splitbody phenotype, which has not been reported in other animals, shows that modification of Bmp may lead to significantly different consequences during development in other vertebrate species.

Comparative analysis of serum proteome in congenital scoliosis patients with TBX6 haploinsufficiency – a first report pointing to lipid metabolism

“…RA inhibits the ability of the paraxial mesoderm to respond to asymmetric signalling downstream of the left-side determinant Nodal, which could cause asymmetry of somitogenesis [38]. In addition, BMP signalling has been shown to be involved in the development of the initial vertebrate body and somite [39,40] and BMP inhibitor, dorsomorphin, produces split-body phenotypes including bilaterally split somites [41]. Considering the roles of BMP and RA in somitogenesis and their demonstrated downstream effects on APOC1 protein [36], we can infer that the down-regulated expression of APOC1 protein in our study and the occurrence of CS are two concurrent phenotypes caused, at least in part, by dysregulation of some common upstream signallings such as RA and BMP.…”

Molecular mechanisms of embryonic tail development in the self-fertilizing mangrove killifish Kryptolebias marmoratus

“…2 E,F). sox3 was used as a marker to investigate the effect of the mutations on the neural tube ( Mourabit et al, 2014 ). stl mutants showed suppression of sox3 expression in the tail spinal cord ( Fig.…”

“…If the defect caused by the noto mutation leads to failure of a fully functional tail bud formation and if that occurs before the end of epiboly, subsequent tail development may be severely affected. We have previously reported that a more severe phenotype in mangrove killifish than in zebrafish was observed in embryos treated with the Bmp inhibitor dorsomorphin ( Mourabit et al, 2014 ). Dorsomorphin-treated zebrafish embryos can complete epiboly and form a tail bud ( Yu et al, 2008 ).…”

“…The tail bud contains an organizing activity that can promote development of tail axial and non-axial mesoderm and neural ectoderm ( Goto et al, 2017 ; Attardi et al, 2018 ). Although the fundamental role of the tail bud may be conserved in all vertebrate animals, due to their differences in embryonic morphology and size, gene expression patterns and the mechanisms by which the tail bud regulates tail tissue specification and patterning vary depending on the species ( Finch et al, 2010 ; Mourabit et al, 2014 ).…”

Genetic Variation Among Certain Fish Species in Terms of Evolution and Lineages

“…In the hybridization. in situ antisense probe for study of Mourabit et al (2014) medaka (O. latipes) ntl probe can successfully stain the Mangrove killifish (K. marmoratus) notochord by in situ hybridization. Both species are belonging to different families, however orthologous genes are highly identical and this convergence was confirmed through the test of the neighbour-joining tree, where these two species were placed in the same clade (Fig.…”