Transforming growth factor-β (TGF-β): A master signal pathway in teleost sex determination

Abstract

Sex determination and differentiation in fish has always been a hot topic in genetic breeding of aquatic animals. With the advances in next-generation sequencing (NGS) in recent years, sex chromosomes and sex determining genes can be efficiently identified in teleosts. To date, master sex determination genes have been elucidated in 114 species, of which 72 species have sex determination genes belonging to TGF-β superfamily. TGF-β is the only signaling pathway that the largest proportion of components, which including ligands (amhy, gsdfy, gdf6), receptors (amhr, bmpr), and regulator (id2bby), have opportunity recognized as a sex determination gene. In this review, we focus on the recent studies about teleost sex-determination genes within TGF-β superfamily and propose several hypotheses on how these genes regulate sex determination process. Differing from other reviews, our review specifically devotes significant attention to all members of the TGF-β signal pathway, not solely the sex determination genes within the TGF-β superfamily. However, the functions of the paralogous genes of TGF superfamily are still needed ongoing research. Further studies are required to more accurately interpret the molecular mechanism of TGF-β superfamily sex determination genes.