ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Mar. Sci.
Sec. Marine Fisheries, Aquaculture and Living Resources
MAPK Pathway-Mediated Regulation of Body Coloration in the leopard coral grouper (Plectropomus leopardus): Functional Roles of jnk1 and p38
Provisionally accepted
- Hainan University, Haikou, China
Select one of your emails
You have multiple emails registered with Frontiers:
Notify me on publication
Please enter your email address:
If you already have an account, please login
You don't have a Frontiers account ? You can register here
Plectropomus leopardus is a marine fish species with high economic value, and its market price is related to its body coloration. During artificial aquaculture, as the farming scale expands, environmental fluctuations often induce stress responses in P. leopardus, leading to gradual darkening or blackening of body coloration. This discoloration reduces the species' commercial value and has become a major factor limiting the sustainable and rapid development of the P. leopardus aquaculture industry. This study used molecular cloning, RNA interference (RNAi), yeast two-hybrid assays, and co-immunoprecipitation experiments to validate the effects of jnk1 and p38 genes on body coloration. The dsRNA was successfully synthesized, and the optimal injection dosage and interference duration were determined, providing technical support for subsequent functional studies of the jnk1 and p38 genes. Yeast two-hybrid assays revealed that the jnk1 and mitf proteins could be co-expressed in the yeast system, whereas no expression was detected between p38 and mitf in yeast. Furthermore, co-immunoprecipitation (Co-IP) analysis confirmed the interaction between jnk1 and mitf proteins, as Western blot detection following immunoprecipitation revealed clear signals for both jnk1 and mitf in the IP group. Following RNAi of jnk1 and p38, the expression levels of melanogenesis-related genes, including microphthalmia-associated transcription factor (mitf), dopachrome tautomerase (dct), melanocortin 1 receptor (mc1r), and tyrosinase (tyr), were significantly downregulated. Among these, dct showed the most pronounced decrease, with an 80% reduction following jnk1-dsRNA injection and a 50% reduction after p38-dsRNA injection. Both yeast two-hybrid and co-immunoprecipitation results showed that jnk1 interacted with mitf, suggesting a direct involvement of jnk1 in the regulation of body coloration in P. leopardus. A direct interaction was identified between jnk1 and mitf, and the binding of jnk1 to mitf was found to modulate mitf activity, thereby regulating the transcription of downstream melanogenesis-related genes and influencing the melanin biosynthesis process in P. leopardus. This study not only enriches the theoretical understanding of body color variation in P. leopardus but also provides a valuable reference for further investigating the functional roles and potential applications of jnk1 and p38 in the regulation of melanogenesis.
Keywords: Plectropomus leopardus, melanogenesis, p38, JNK1, RNAi
Received: 17 Oct 2025; Accepted: 24 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Tan, Hu, Li, Zheng, Zhang, Luo and Wen. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Xin Wen
Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.