PUBLICATION

Transcriptomes of Zebrafish in Early Stages of Multiple Viral Invasions Reveal the Role of Sterols in Innate Immune Switch-On

Authors
Ouyang, G., Yuan, L., Xia, X.Q., Zhang, W., Shi, M.
ID
ZDB-PUB-230312-44
Date
2023
Source
International Journal of Molecular Sciences   24(5): (Journal)
Registered Authors
Ouyang, Gang, Xia, Xiao-Qin
Keywords
early stage of viral infection, steroids, stress, switch-on innate immune
MeSH Terms
  • Animals
  • Immunity, Innate
  • Receptors, Pattern Recognition/genetics
  • Sterols
  • Transcriptome
  • Viruses*/genetics
  • Zebrafish*/genetics
PubMed
36901854 Full text @ Int. J. Mol. Sci.
Abstract
Although it is widely accepted that in the early stages of virus infection, fish pattern recognition receptors are the first to identify viruses and initiate innate immune responses, this process has never been thoroughly investigated. In this study, we infected larval zebrafish with four different viruses and analyzed whole-fish expression profiles from five groups of fish, including controls, at 10 h after infection. At this early stage of virus infection, 60.28% of the differentially expressed genes displayed the same expression pattern across all viruses, with the majority of immune-related genes downregulated and genes associated with protein synthesis and sterol synthesis upregulated. Furthermore, these protein synthesis- and sterol synthesis-related genes were strongly positively correlated in the expression pattern of the rare key upregulated immune genes, IRF3 and IRF7, which were not positively correlated with any known pattern recognition receptor gene. We hypothesize that viral infection triggered a large amount of protein synthesis that stressed the endoplasmic reticulum and the organism responded to this stress by suppressing the body's immune system while also mediating an increase in steroids. The increase in sterols then participates the activation of IRF3 and IRF7 and triggers the fish's innate immunological response to the virus infection.
Genes / Markers
Figures
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Expression
Phenotype
Mutations / Transgenics
Human Disease / Model
Sequence Targeting Reagents
Fish
Antibodies
Orthology
Engineered Foreign Genes
Mapping