RESEARCH ARTICLE Comparative transcriptome analyses reveal the genetic basis underlying the immune function of three amphibians' skin Wenqiao Fan1,2,3☯, Yusong Jiang1☯, Meixia Zhang1, Donglin Yang1,2,3, Zhongzhu Chen1,2,3, Hanchang Sun1*, Xuelian Lan1,2,3, Fan Yan1, Jingming Xu1, Wanan Yuan1 1 Chongqing Research Center of Conservation and Development on Rare and Endangered Aquatic Resources, Chongqing University of Arts and Sciences, Yongchuan, Chongqing, China, 2 Chongqing Key Laboratory of Kinase Modulators as Innovative Medicine, Yongchuan, Chongqing, China, 3 Chongqing a1111111111 Engineering Laboratory of Targeted and Innovative Therapeutics, Yongchuan, Chongqing, China a1111111111 a1111111111 ☯ These authors contributed equally to this work. a1111111111 *
[email protected] a1111111111 Abstract Skin as the first barrier against external invasions plays an essential role for the survival of OPEN ACCESS amphibians on land. Understanding the genetic basis of skin function is significant in reveal- Citation: Fan W, Jiang Y, Zhang M, Yang D, Chen ing the mechanisms underlying immunity of amphibians. In this study, we de novo Z, Sun H, et al. (2017) Comparative transcriptome sequenced and comparatively analyzed skin transcriptomes from three different amphibian analyses reveal the genetic basis underlying the immune function of three amphibians' skin. PLoS species, Andrias davidianus, Bufo gargarizans, and Rana nigromaculata Hallowell. Func- ONE 12(12): e0190023. https://doi.org/10.1371/ tional classification of unigenes in each amphibian showed high accordance, with the most journal.pone.0190023 represented GO terms and KEGG pathways related to basic biological processes, such as Editor: Zhong-Jian Liu, The National Orchid binding and metabolism and immune system. As for the unigenes, GO and KEGG distribu- Conservation Center of China; The Orchid tions of conserved orthologs in each species were similar, with the predominantly enriched Conservation & Research Center of Shenzhen, CHINA pathways including RNA polymerase, nucleotide metabolism, and defense.