Deep Sequencing of the Human Retinae Reveals the Expression of Odorant Receptors

Abstract

Several studies have demonstrated that the expression of odorant receptors (ORs) occurs in various tissues. These findings have served as a basis for functional studies that demonstrate the potential of ORs as drug targets for a clinical application. To the best of our knowledge, this report describes the first evaluation of the mRNA expression of ORs and the localization of OR proteins in the human retina that set a stage for subsequent functional analyses. RNA-Sequencing datasets of three individual neural retinae were generated using Next-generation sequencing and were compared to previously published but reanalyzed datasets of the peripheral and the macular human retina and to reference tissues. The protein localization of several ORs was investigated by immunohistochemistry. The transcriptome analyses detected an average of 14 OR transcripts in the neural retina, of which OR6B3 is one of the most highly expressed ORs. Immunohistochemical stainings of retina sections localized OR2W3 to the photosensitive outer segment membranes of cones, whereas OR6B3 was found in various cell types. OR5P3 and OR10AD1 were detected at the base of the photoreceptor connecting cilium, and OR10AD1 was also localized to the nuclear envelope of all of the nuclei of the retina. The cell type-specific expression of the ORs in the retina suggests that there are unique biological functions for those receptors.

Elevated CO2 impairs olfactory‐mediated neural and behavioral responses and gene expression in ocean‐phase coho salmon (Oncorhynchus kisutch)

“…The reason for the inclusion of photoreception-related genes within the expression profile of the olfactory bulbs remains unclear; however, it is likely that genes involved in the olfactory and photoreception systems may share similar signal transduction function in both tissues. This hypothesis is supported by at least two other studies that reported the expression of olfactory genes in the visual system (Jovancevic et al, 2017;Pronin et al, 2014).…”

Odorant Receptor 51E2 Agonist β-ionone Regulates RPE Cell Migration and Proliferation

“…The datasets were summarized, and the expression data are presented as the means of the FPKM values (mFPKM). The neural retina raw data were taken from an earlier study (Jovancevic et al, 2017b ). All the datasets were equivalently analyzed with the same parameters.…”

“…The datasets were visualized and investigated by the Integrative Genomic Viewer ( http://software.broadinstitute.org/software/igv/ ) for proving sequence alignments and for the correct mapping of reads for the top expressed genes. We determined a cutoff value of 0.3 FPKM for OR expression as described in Jovancevic et al ( 2017b ).…”

“…The activation of ectopically expressed ORs results, in most cases also, in an increase of the intracellular Ca 2+ level, but this is not always directly linked to the observed function. Interestingly, a recent transcriptome analysis revealed the cell specific expression of ORs in the human neural retina (Jovancevic et al, 2017b ). In addition to the human neural retina, ORs were identified in the human fetal RPE.…”

A Rose Extract Protects the Skin against Stress Mediators: A Potential Role of Olfactory Receptors

“…Interestingly, we noticed that the expression patterns of the three ORs differ between skin explants and epidermis. Specific distribution of various ORs was also previously reported in the human eye, where OR10AD1, OR6B3, and OR5P3 can be found in different retina cell types [ 32 ]. Similarly, in human spermatozoa, different OR proteins are localized at distinct specialized cellular compartments such as the equatorial segment, the midpiece, and the tail [ 33 ].…”