Project description:Hibernation is an energy-saving strategy adopted by a wide range of mammals to survive highly seasonal or unpredictable environments. Arctic ground squirrels living in Alaska provide an extreme example, with 6-9 months long hibernation seasons when body temperature alternates between levels near 0 C during torpor and 37 C during arousal episodes. Heat production during hibernation is provided, in part, by non-shivering thermogenesis that occurs in large deposits of brown adipose tissue (BAT). BAT is active at tissue temperatures from 0 to 37 C during rewarming and continuously at near 0 C during torpor in subfreezing conditions. Despite its crucial role in hibernation, the global gene expression patterns in BAT during hibernation compared to the non-hibernation season remain largely unknown. We report a large-scale study of differential gene expression in BAT between winter hibernating and summer active arctic ground squirrels using mouse microarrays. Selected differentially expressed genes identified on the arrays were validated by quantitative real-time PCR using ground squirrel specific primers. Our results show that the mRNA levels of the genes involved in nearly every step of the biochemical pathway leading to non-shivering thermogenesis are significantly increased in BAT during hibernation, whereas those of genes involved in protein biosynthesis are significantly decreased compared to the summer active animals in August. The differentially expressed genes also include those involved in adipose differentiation, substrate transport, and structure remodeling, which may enhance thermogenesis at low tissue temperatures in BAT. Keywords: hibernating animals vs. summer active animals
Project description:Understanding biological diversity and distribution patterns at multiple spatial scales is a central issue in ecology. Here, we investigated the biogeographical patterns of functional genes in soil microbes from 24 arctic heath sites using GeoChip-based metagenomics and principal coordinates of neighbour matrices (PCNM)-based analysis. Functional gene richness varied considerably among sites, while the proportions of each major functional gene category were evenly distributed. Functional gene composition varied significantly at most medium and broad spatial scales, and the PCNM analyses indicated that 14-20% of the variation in total and major functional gene categories could be attributed primarily to relatively broad-scale spatial effects that were consistent with broad-scale variation in soil pH and total nitrogen. The combination of variance partitioning and multi-scales analysis indicated that spatial distance effects contributed 12% to variation in functional gene composition,whereas environmental factors contributed only 3%. This relatively strong influence of spatial as compared to environmental variation in determining functional gene distributions contrasts sharply with typical microbial phylotype/species-based biogeographical patterns in the Arctic and elsewhere. Our results suggest that the distributions of soil functional genes cannot be predicted from phylogenetic distributions because spatial factors associated with historical contingencies are relatively important determinants of their biogeography.
Project description:Hibernation is energy saving adaptation involving suppression of activity to survive in highly seasonal environments. Immobility and disuse generate muscle loss in most mammalian species. In contrast to other mammals, bears and ground squirrels demonstrate limited muscle atrophy over the physical inactivity of winter hibernation. This suggests that hibernating mammals have adaptive mechanisms to prevent disuse muscle atrophy. To identify common transcriptional program underlying molecular mechanisms preventing muscle loss, we conducted a large-scale gene expression screening in hind limb muscles comparing hibernating and summer active black bears and arctic ground squirrels by the use of custom 9,600 probe cDNA microarrays. The molecular pathway analysis showed an elevated proportion of overexpressed genes involved in all stages of protein biosynthesis and ribosome biogenesis in muscle of both species during hibernation that implies induction of translation at different hibernation states. The induction of protein biosynthesis likely contributes to attenuation of disuse muscle atrophy through prolonged periods of immobility and starvation. This adaptive mechanism allows hibernating mammals to maintain full musculoskeletal function and preserve mobility during and immediately after hibernation, thus promoting survival. The lack of directional changes in genes of protein catabolic pathways does not support the importance of metabolic suppression for preserving muscle mass during winter. Coordinated reduction of multiply genes involved in oxidation reduction and glucose metabolism detected in both species is consistent with metabolic suppression and lower energy demand in skeletal muscle during inactivity of hibernation. Arctic ground squirrels sampled during winter hibernation were compared with the animals sampled during summer. Muscle was hybridized on a custom 9,600 probes nylon membrane microarray platform. Ten in late torpor, four in early arousal, then in late arousal were studied in experiments.
Project description:Arctic charr thrive at high densities and can live in freshwater year round, making this species especially suitable for inland, closed containment aquaculture. However, it is a cold water salmonid, which both limits where the species can be farmed and places wild populations at particular risk to climate change. Previously, we identified genes associated with tolerance and intolerance to acute, lethal temperature stress in Arctic charr. However, there remained a need to examine the genes involved in the stress response to more realistic temperatures that could be experienced during a summer heat wave in grow-out tanks that are not artificially cooled, or under natural conditions. Here, we exposed Arctic charr to moderate heat stress of 15–18ºC for 72 hours, and gill tissues extracted before, during (i.e., at 72 hrs), immediately after cooling and after 72 hours of recovery at ambient temperature (6ºC) were used for gene expression profiling by microarray and qPCR analyses. The results revealed an expected pattern for heat shock protein (Hsp) expression, which was highest during heat exposure, with significantly reduced expression (approaching control levels) quickly thereafter. We also found that the expression of numerous ribosomal proteins was significantly elevated immediately and 72 hrs after cooling, suggesting that the gill tissues were undergoing ribosomal biogenesis while recovering from damage caused by heat stress. We suggest that these are candidate gene targets for the future development of genetic markers for broodstock development or for monitoring temperature stress and recovery in wild or cultured conditions.
Project description:Arctic charr thrive at high densities and can live in freshwater year round, making this species especially suitable for inland, closed containment aquaculture. However, it is a cold water salmonid, which both limits where the species can be farmed and places wild populations at particular risk to climate change. Previously, we identified genes associated with tolerance and intolerance to acute, lethal temperature stress in Arctic charr. However, there remained a need to examine the genes involved in the stress response to more realistic temperatures that could be experienced during a summer heat wave in grow-out tanks that are not artificially cooled, or under natural conditions. Here, we exposed Arctic charr to moderate heat stress of 15–18ºC for 72 hours, and gill tissues extracted before, during (i.e., at 72 hrs), immediately after cooling and after 72 hours of recovery at ambient temperature (6ºC) were used for gene expression profiling by microarray and qPCR analyses. The results revealed an expected pattern for heat shock protein (Hsp) expression, which was highest during heat exposure, with significantly reduced expression (approaching control levels) quickly thereafter. We also found that the expression of numerous ribosomal proteins was significantly elevated immediately and 72 hrs after cooling, suggesting that the gill tissues were undergoing ribosomal biogenesis while recovering from damage caused by heat stress. We suggest that these are candidate gene targets for the future development of genetic markers for broodstock development or for monitoring temperature stress and recovery in wild or cultured conditions. 24 microarray slides representing 6 individuals from 4 treatment groups (Control, During, After and Recovery). One test cDNA labeled with Cy5 and the common reference aRNA labeled with Cy3 was hybridized to each slide. Reference design: 6x control fish, 6x group D fish, 6x group A fish, 6x group R fish.
Project description:To carry out population genetics analyses of the Arctic gregion we carried out Illumina Bead-Array-based enotyping on 18 samples from Greenland.
Project description:The objective of this study was to identify the different functional genes involved in key biogeochemical cycles in the low Arctic regions. Understanding the microbial diversity in the Arctic region is an important step to determine the effects of climate change on these areas.
Project description:C5aR1, a receptor for the complement activation proinflammatory fragment, C5a, is primarily expressed on cells of the myeloid lineage, and to a lesser extent on endothelial cells and neurons in brain. Previous work demonstrated C5aR1 antagonist, PMX205, decreased amyloid pathology and suppressed cognitive deficits in Alzheimer Disease (AD) mouse models. In the Arctic AD mouse model, genetic deletion of C5aR1 prevented behavior deficits at 10 months. However, the molecular mechanisms of this protection has not been definitively demonstrated. To understand the role of microglial C5aR1 in the Arctic AD mouse model, we have taken advantage of the CX3CR1GFP and CCR2RFP reporter mice to distinguish microglia as GFP-positive and infiltrating monocytes as GFP and RFP positive, for subsequent transcriptome analysis on specifically sorted myeloid populations from wild type and AD mouse models. Immunohistochemical analysis of mice aged to 2, 5, 7 and 10 months showed no change in amyloid beta (Ab) deposition in the Arctic C5aR1 knockout (KO) mice relative to that seen in the Arctic mice. Of importance, no CCR2+ monocytes/macrophages were found near the plaques in the Arctic brain with or without C5aR1. RNA-seq analysis on microglia from these mice identified inflammation related genes as differentially expressed, with increased expression in the Arctic mice relative to wildtype and decreased expression in the Arctic/C5aR1KO relative to Arctic. In addition, phagosomal-lysosomal proteins and protein degradation pathways that were increased in the Arctic mice were further increased in the Arctic/C5aR1KO mice. These data are consistent with a microglial polarization state with restricted induction of inflammatory genes and enhancement of clearance pathways.