Using Tg(Vtg1:mcherry) Zebrafish Embryos to Test the Estrogenic Effects of Endocrine Disrupting Compounds.

There are many endocrine disrupting compounds (EDC) in the environment, especially estrogenic substances. The detection of these substances is difficult due to their chemical diversity; therefore, increasingly more effect-detecting methods are used, such as estrogenic effect-sensitive biomonitor/bioindicator organisms. These biomonitoring organisms include several fish models.

A Method for Zebrafish Follicle Transplantation into Recipient Mothers for the Generation of Fertilizable Eggs and Viable Offspring.

In zebrafish and other externally developing animals, maternal effect gene products significantly contribute to embryonic and larval development. Several methods exist for both forward and reverse genetic manipulation of maternal gene products, yet it remains technically difficult to interfere with maternal gene products. Therefore, alternative methods to manipulate maternal factors in oocytes remain of interest.

Estrogen sensitive liver transgenic zebrafish (Danio rerio) line (Tg(vtg1:mCherry)) suitable for the direct detection of estrogenicity in environmental samples.

Environmental estrogens are a serious concern worldwide due to their ubiquity and adverse ecotoxicological and health effects. Chemical structure of these substances is highly diverse, therefore estrogenicity cannot be predicted on the basis of molecular structure. Furthermore, estimation of estrogenicity of environmental samples based on chemical analytics of suspects is difficult given the complex interaction of chemicals and the impact on estrogenicity.

Enhancer Trapping and Annotation in Zebrafish Mediated with Sleeping Beauty, piggyBac and Tol2 Transposons.

Although transposon-mediated enhancer trapping (ET) is successfully applied in diverse models, the efficiency of various transposon systems varies significantly, and little information is available regarding efficiency of enhancer trapping by various transposons in zebrafish. Most potential enhancers (Ens) still lack evidence of actual En activity. Here, we compared the differences in ET efficiency between (), () and transposons.

Expression and knockdown of zebrafish folliculin suggests requirement for embryonic brain morphogenesis.

Background: Birt-Hogg-Dubé syndrome (BHD) is a dominantly inherited familial cancer syndrome characterised by the development of benign skin fibrofolliculomas, multiple lung and kidney cysts, spontaneous pneumothorax and susceptibility to renal cell carcinoma. BHD is caused by mutations in the gene encoding Folliculin (FLCN). Little is known about what FLCN does in a healthy individual and how best to treat those with BHD.

A multicassette Gateway vector set for high throughput and comparative analyses in ciona and vertebrate embryos.

Background: The past few years have seen a vast increase in the amount of genomic data available for a growing number of taxa, including sets of full length cDNA clones and cis-regulatory sequences. Large scale cross-species comparisons of protein function and cis-regulatory sequences may help to understand the emergence of specific traits during evolution.

Principal Findings: To facilitate such comparisons, we developed a Gateway compatible vector set, which can be used to systematically dissect cis-regulatory sequences, and overexpress wild type or tagged proteins in a variety of chordate systems.