IMMUNE MODULATIONS OF THE MITOCHONDRIAL ANTIVIRAL SIGNALING PROTEIN(MAVS) OF THE BLACK ROCKFISH (Sebastes schlegelii)  

Hyerim Yang*, Hyukjae Kwon, Myoungjin Kim, Jehee Lee
 
Email: yhr930@gmail.com
Department of Marine Life Sciences, School of Marine Biomedical Sciences, Jeju National University, Republic of Korea.

The mitochondrial antiviral signaling protein (MAVS) plays a vital role to defense the microbial pathogens in the host cellular innate immune responses and it is also important in the signal transduction of antiviral gene cascade. In this study, we have identified and characterized the MAVS from black rock fish (RfMAVS), Sebastes schlegelii, and determined the spatial and temporal mRNA expression by using quantitative real time PCR (qPCR). In the in silico study, we have used various bioinformatics tools and webservers to discover the characteristic molecular features of RfMAVS. The putative open reading frame of RfMAVS was 1770 bp that coded for a protein of 590 amino acids. It has no signal peptide and its molecular mass was approximately 62.47 kDa and isoelectric point was 4.59. The pairwise sequence alignments showed that RfMAVS shared 73.7% of the identity and 83.9% of similarity with Oplegnathus fasciatus MAVS. A ubiquitous expression of RfMAVS transcript was revealed at the 10 tissues (Blood, Head kidney, Spleen, Liver, Gill, Intestine, Kidney, Muscle, Skin and Heart) and significantly (P < 0.05) highest mRNA expression was observed in the blood. The RfMAVS mRNA expression was highest in blood, head kidney and spleen at 12 h post injection (p.i.) of Poly I:C, where liver has shown significant up-regulation at 24 h p.i.. Collectively, the RfMAVS is belongs to the teleostean MAVS counterpart and possess the immune responsive regulations upon viral infections.