title: Immune competence assessment in marine medaka (Orzyias melastigma)-a holistic approach for immunotoxicology.
abstract: Many anthropogenic pollutants in coastal marine environments can induce immune impairments in wild fish and reduce their survival fitness. There is a pressing need to establish sensitive and high throughput in vivo tools to systematically evaluate the immunosuppressive effects of contaminants in marine teleosts. This study reviewed a battery of in vivo immune function detection technologies established for different biological hierarchies at molecular (immune function pathways and genes by next generation sequencing (NGS)), cellular (leukocytes profiles by flow cytometry), tissues/organ system (whole adult histo-array), and organism (host resistance assays (HRAs)) levels, to assess the immune competence of marine medaka Oryzias melastigma. This approach enables a holistic assessment of fish immune competence under different chemical exposure or environmental scenarios. The data obtained will also be useful to unravel the underlying immunotoxic mechanisms. Intriguingly, NGS analysis of hepatic immune gene expression profiles (male > female) are in support of the bacterial HRA findings, in which infection-induced mortality was consistently higher in females than in males. As such, reproductive stages and gender-specific responses must be taken into consideration when assessing the risk of immunotoxicants in the aquatic environment. The distinct phenotypic sexual dimorphism and short generation time (3 months) of marine medaka offer additional advantages for sex-related immunotoxicological investigation.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory in Marine Pollution, Department of Biology and Chemistry, City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: Roy R
authors.initials: RR
authors.lastname: Ye
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory in Marine Pollution, Department of Biology and Chemistry, City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: Drew R
authors.initials: DR
authors.lastname: Peterson
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory in Marine Pollution, Department of Biology and Chemistry, City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: Frauke
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Seemann
authors.affiliation: Centre for Marine Environmental Studies, Ehime University, Matsuyama, 790-8577, Japan.
authors.forename: Shin-Ichi
authors.initials: SI
authors.lastname: Kitamura
authors.affiliation: Department of Biological Science, College of Science, Sungkyunkwan University, Suwon, 440-746, South Korea.
authors.forename: J S
authors.initials: JS
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.affiliation: Department of Biomedical Sciences, City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: Terrance C K
authors.initials: TCK
authors.lastname: Lau
authors.affiliation: School of Biomedical Sciences, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, New Territories, Hong Kong.
authors.forename: Stephen K W
authors.initials: SKW
authors.lastname: Tsui
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory in Marine Pollution, Department of Biology and Chemistry, City University of Hong Kong, Kowloon Tong, Hong Kong. bhdwtau@cityu.edu.hk.|Shenzhen Key Laboratory for the Sustainable Use of Marine Biodiversity, Research Centre for the Oceans and Human Health, Shenzhen Research Institute, City University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen, 518057, China. bhdwtau@cityu.edu.hk.
authors.forename: Doris W T
authors.initials: DWT
authors.lastname: Au
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D005260:Female; D059014:High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing; D000922:Immunotoxins / Q000633:toxicity*; D008099:Liver / Q000378:metabolism; D008297:Male; D009990:Oryzias / Q000235:genetics / Q000276:immunology*; D012727:Sex Characteristics; D059467:Transcriptome; D014874:Water Pollutants, Chemical / Q000633:toxicity*
chemical_list: D000922:Immunotoxins; D014874:Water Pollutants, Chemical
keywords: Blood leukocytes profiles; Fish immunotoxicology; Hepatic immune genes; Immune system histopathology; Microbial pathogens; O. melastigma; Sexual dimorphism