Data from: The influence of parental effects on transcriptomic landscape during early development in brook charr (Salvelinus fontinalis, Mitchill)

Parental effects represent an important source of variation in offspring phenotypes. Depending on the specific mechanisms involved, parental effects may be caused to different degrees by either the maternal or the paternal parent, and these effects may in turn act at different stages of development. To detect parental effects acting on gene transcription regulation and length phenotype during ontogeny, the transcriptomic profiles of two reciprocal hybrids from Laval × Rupert and Laval × Domestic populations of brook charr were compared at hatching, yolk sac resorption and 15 weeks after exogenous feeding. Using a salmonid cDNA microarray, our results show that parental effects modulated gene expression among reciprocal hybrids only at the yolk sac resorption stage. In addition, Laval × Domestic and Laval × Rupert reciprocal hybrids differed in the magnitude of theses parental effects, with 199 and 630 differentially expressed transcripts, respectively. This corresponds to a maximum of 18.5% of the analyzed transcripts. These transcripts are functionally related to cell cycle, nucleic acid metabolism and intracellular protein traffic, which is consistent with observed differences associated with embryonic development and growth differences in other fish species. Our results thus illustrate how parental effects on patterns of gene transcription seem dependent on the genetic architecture of the parents. In addition, in absence of transcriptional differences, non-transcript deposits in the yolk sac could contribute to the observed length differences among the reciprocal hybrids before yolk sac resorption.

亲本效应（parental effects）是子代表型变异的重要来源。依据具体作用机制，亲本效应可由母本或父本以不同程度介导，且可在发育的不同阶段发挥调控功能。为探究个体发育（ontogeny）过程中作用于基因转录调控与体长表型的亲本效应，本研究对拉瓦（Laval）×鲁珀特（Rupert）及拉瓦×家养溪红点鲑（brook charr）两个种群的正反交杂种（reciprocal hybrids），分别在孵化期、卵黄囊吸收期与外源摄食15周后开展转录组谱（transcriptomic profiles）对比分析。采用鲑科cDNA微阵列（salmonid cDNA microarray）进行检测，结果显示：亲本效应仅在卵黄囊吸收期对正反交杂种的基因表达产生调控作用。此外，拉瓦×家养与拉瓦×鲁珀特正反交杂种的亲本效应强度存在显著差异，二者分别对应199个和630个差异表达转录本（differentially expressed transcripts），占所分析转录本总数的比例最高可达18.5%。上述差异表达转录本的功能富集于细胞周期、核酸代谢与细胞内蛋白质运输通路，与其他鱼类中报道的胚胎发育及生长差异相关特征相符。本研究结果证实，亲本效应对基因转录模式的调控作用依赖于亲本的遗传架构。此外，在卵黄囊吸收阶段前，若未出现转录层面的差异，卵黄囊中未参与转录的沉积物质或可解释正反交杂种间观测到的体长差异。