Comparative transcriptomic analysis reveals tissue-specific and shared adaptive mechanisms to cold stress in the liver and brain of Eleutheronema tetradactylum
This BioProject contains paired-end mRNA sequencing data of Eleutheronema tetradactylum (four-finger threadfin) under chronic cold stress, aiming to reveal shared and tissue-specific adaptive transcriptional mechanisms in liver and brain tissues. A total of 18 juvenile fish were collected from a commercial fish farm in Zhanjiang, China. The average body weight was 13.26 g, with individual weight ranging from 10.88 g to 15.64 g. Fish were acclimated at 28 degree Celsius for one week, then subjected to chronic cold stress at 18 degree Celsius, which is near the critical low-temperature threshold of this warm-water fish. Sampling time points included control group at day 0 under 28 degree Celsius, cold treatment for 7 days and cold treatment for 14 days. Three biological replicates were set for each time point of both liver and brain tissues. Total RNA was extracted from tissues frozen in liquid nitrogen. poly(A)-enriched mRNA libraries were constructed with Hieff NGS Ultima dual-mode mRNA kit. All libraries were sequenced on Illumina NovaSeq 6000 platform with paired-end 150 bp reads. Raw FASTQ data were deposited into SRA database. Downstream analyses included differentially expressed gene screening via DESeq2, GO and KEGG functional enrichment of shared and tissue-specific differentially expressed genes, and qRT-PCR validation of 8 key cold-responsive genes. This dataset shows that liver mainly participates in lipid metabolism and cell damage clearance under cold stress, while brain maintains neural signal homeostasis. It provides molecular resources for cold tolerance research and overwinter aquaculture of four-finger threadfin.