Identification of crucial factors involved in Cynoglossus semilaevis sexual size dimorphism by GWAS and demonstration of zbed1 regulatory network by DAP-seq.

Sexual size dimorphism (SSD), whereby females and males exhibit different body sizes, are widely documented in animals. To explore crucial regulators implicated in female-biased SSD of Chinese tongue sole (Cynoglossus semilaevis), GWAS was conducted on 350 females and 59 males. Twenty SNPs and 25 genes including zbed1 , nsd3 , cdc45 , klhl29 , and smad4 with -log(p) > 7 were screened, mainly mapping to sex chromosome. The chromosome W-linked gene z bed1 attracted particular attention because it is a master key for cell proliferation. Thus, the regulatory network of zbed1 in C. semilaevis was explored by DAP-seq and 1352 peaks were discovered in the female brain. Moreover, zbed1 potentially regulated hippo signaling pathway, cell cycle, translation, and PI3k-Akt signaling pathway in C. semilaevis. These findings identify crucial SNPs and genes associated with female-biased SSD in C. semilaevis , also provide the first genome-wide survey for the zbed1 regulatory network in fish species. • GWAS of females and males Cynoglossus semilaevis identified 20 SNPs with -log(p) > 7, mainly located on sex chromosome w and z. • 25 genes including zbed1 , nsd3 , cdc45 , klhl29 , and smad4 were annotated around the region of 20 kb from the significant SNPs. • DAP-seq revealed that zbed1 potentially regulated hippo signaling pathway, cell cycle, translation and PI3k-Akt pathway. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]