The giant freshwater prawn is well-researched in aquaculture, but gaps remain in understanding its embryonic development and sexual differentiation mechanisms.
By conducting RNA sequencing on male and female embryos over five developmental days, researchers characterized gene expression related to early development stages.
They discovered significant differences in gene expression between sexes, indicating that unique genetic factors may be involved in the prawn's sex differentiation, creating a transcriptional map that will aid future studies in this area.