Preliminary Studies Of The Function Of Zebrafish ZIP7 Gene During Early Embryogenesis

ZIP7 is a member of zinc transporter (Solute-Linked carrier 39A, SLC39A) family. The in vivo function of ZIP7, however, was unknown, without ZIP 7 gene knockout animol model. In this study, we have explored the developmental role of ZIP7 using the zebrafish model, which has become a powerful model organism for studying the gene function. We investigated the gene expression patterns during early embryonic development. Real-time PCR assay showed that ZIP7 mRNA was richly detected during embryogenesis. Whole-mount in situ hybridization assay showed that ZIP7 mRNA was expressed ubiquitously during 12 hour post-fertilization (hpf), however, at the 24 hpf and the later stages, ZIP7 mRNA was only detected in eyes. Using a morpholino-antisense (MO) gene knockdown approach, ZIP7 knockdown showed several malformations such as smaller eyes, an enlarged pericardial region, and campylorrhachia. Furthermore, re-injection of a MO-resistant form of ZIP7 mRNA which was cloned and transcriped in vitro to "rescue" the MO-induced defects, implying that ZIP7 played a role in eyes development specially during early embryomic development. Hatching the ZIP7 knockdown embryoes with 50μM zinc in Egg water could "rescue" the MO-induced defects as well. Besides, Synchrotron Radiation-X Ray Fluorescence (SR-XRF) showed the concentration of zinc in eyes was reduced. Together, the data indicated that ZIP7 and zinc could be involed in the development of eyes during zebrafish early embryonic development. Which provides a novel insight into the role of ZIP7 in vivo.