Journal
SCIENCE CHINA-LIFE SCIENCES
Volume 54, Issue 2, Pages 159-165Publisher
SCIENCE PRESS
DOI: 10.1007/s11427-010-4121-2
Keywords
Follistatin1; myostatin; muscle growth; transgenic; zebrafish
Categories
Funding
- National Natural Science Foundation of China [30671600]
- National Basic Research Program of China [2010CB126302, 2009CB118701]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Myostatin is a member of the transforming growth factor-beta (TGF-beta) super-family and functions as a negative regulator of muscle growth. Binding of the specific receptor, Activin receptor IIB (Act RIIB), with myostatin or other related TGF-beta members, could be inhibited by the activin-binding protein follistatin (Fst) in mammals. Overexpressing Fst in mouse skeletal muscle leads to muscle hypertrophy and hyperplasia. To determine if Fst has similar roles in fish, we generated transgenic zebrafish expressing high levels of zebrafish Fst1 using the promoter of the zebrafish skeletal muscle-specific gene, myosin, light polypeptide 2, skeletal muscle (Mylz2). Independent transgenic zebrafish lines exhibited elevated expression levels of myogenic regulatory genes MyoD and Pax7 in muscle cells. Adult Fst1 overexpressing transgenic zebrafish exhibited a slight body weight increase. The high level of Fst1 expression dramatically increased myofiber numbers in skeletal muscle, without significantly changing the fiber size. Our findings suggest that Fst1 overexpression can promote zebrafish muscle growth by enhancing myofiber hyperplasia.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available