title: Structure, tissue distribution and estrogen regulation of splice variants of the sea bream estrogen receptor α gene.
abstract: Estrogen actions are mainly mediated by specific nuclear estrogen receptors (ERs), for which different genes and a diversity of transcript variants have been identified, mainly in mammals. In this study, we investigated the presence of ER splice variants in the teleost fish gilthead sea bream (Sparus auratus), by comparison with the genomic organization of the related species Takifugu rubripes. Two exon2-deleted ERα transcript variants were isolated from liver cDNA of estradiol-treated fish. The ΔE2 variant lacks ERα exon 2, generating a premature termination codon and a putative C-terminal truncated receptor, while the ΔE2,3* variant contains an in-frame deletion of exon 2 and part of exon 3 and codes for a putative ERα protein variant lacking most of the DNA-binding domain. Both variants were expressed at very low levels in several female and male sea bream tissues, and their expression was highly inducible in liver by estradiol-17β treatment with a strong positive correlation with the typical wild-type (wt) ERα response in this tissue. These findings identify novel estrogen responsive splice variants of fish ERα, and provide the basis for future studies to investigate possible modulation of wt-ER actions by splice variants.
authors.affiliation: University of Algarve, Campus de Gambelas, Faro, Portugal. ppinto@ualg.pt
authors.forename: P I S
authors.initials: PI
authors.lastname: Pinto
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Teodósio
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Socorro
authors.forename: D M
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Power
authors.forename: A V M
authors.initials: AV
authors.lastname: Canário
mesh_terms: D017398:Alternative Splicing / Q000235:genetics; D000818:Animals; D047628:Estrogen Receptor alpha / Q000096:biosynthesis / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism*; D004967:Estrogens / Q000378:metabolism*; D005091:Exons; D005260:Female; D008099:Liver / Q000378:metabolism; D008297:Male; D020033:Protein Isoforms / Q000096:biosynthesis / Q000235:genetics / Q000378:metabolism; D021541:Sea Bream / Q000378:metabolism*; D017384:Sequence Deletion / Q000235:genetics; D023741:Takifugu / Q000378:metabolism; D014018:Tissue Distribution
chemical_list: D047628:Estrogen Receptor alpha; D004967:Estrogens; D020033:Protein Isoforms