Rapid growth cost in “all-fish” growth hormone gene transgenic carp: Reduced critical swimming speed

Abstract

Evidence has accumulated that there is a trade-off between benefits and costs associated with rapid growth. A trade-off between growth rates and critical swimming speed (U crit ) had been also reported to be common in teleost fish. We hypothesize that growth acceleration in the F 3 generation of "all-fish" growth hormone gene (GH) transgenic common carp (Cyprinus carpio L.) would reduce the swimming abilities. Growth and swimming performance between transgenic fish and non-transgenic controls were compared. The results showed that transgenic fish had a mean body weight 1.4-1.9-fold heavier, and a mean specific growth rate (SGR) value 6%-10% higher than the controls. Transgenic fish, however, had a mean absolute U crit (cm/s) value 22% or mean relative U crit (BL/s) value 24% lower than the controls. It suggested that fast-growing "all-fish" GH-transgenic carp were inferior swimmers. It is also supported that there was a trade-off between growth rates and swimming performance, i.e. faster-growing individuals had lower critical swimming speed.transgenic fish, growth, swimming performance, trade-off, growth hormone, critical swimming speedSince the first successful case of transgenic fish was achieved [1] , transgenic technology has made great advance in fish, and fish may be considered the best candidate for the first marketable transgenic animal for human consumption [2,3]

The hematological response to exhaustive exercise in ‘all-fish’ growth hormone transgenic common carp (Cyprinus carpio L.)

“…This construct contains the recombinant sequence of the grass carp Ctenopharyngodon idellus (Cuvier & Valenciennes) growth hormone gene driven by a common carp β-actin gene promoter (Wang et al, 2001). F 5 'all-fish' GH transgenic carp used in the present study were produced on April 25, 2007, from crosses between a wild-type female and a F 4 'all-fish' GH transgenic male of a fast-growing transgenic strain as reported in previous studies (Fu et al, 2007a;Li et al, 2007). A batch of nontransgenic controls was also produced on the same day.…”

“…Many countries are discussing or developing safety assessment strategies for fast-growing transgenic fish, and growth hormone (GH) transgenic fish are near the point of widespread commercial use (Niiler, 2000;Fu et al, 2005;Hu et al, 2007). Many studies have shown that in addition to enhancing growth rates, transgenic fish overexpressing GH can show a broad range of pleiotropic effects on morphology, physiology, metabolism, immunology and behavior (Fu et al, 1998(Fu et al, , 2007aDevlin et al, 2004Devlin et al, , 2006Wang et al, 2006;Li et al, 2007Li et al, , 2009Guan et al, 2008). Transgenic fish can be a useful model for examining the effects of GH on many physiological processes (Devlin et al, 2004).…”

“…There are no reports on physiological recovery to exhaustive exercise in fastgrowing GH transgenic fish. For common carp, the level of plasma GH in 'all-fish' GH transgenic individuals was about 50 to 250-fold that of non-transgenics dependent on water temperature (Zhong et al, 2009a,b), and these fish differed from non-transgenics in their metabolism, physiology and behavior (Wang et al, 2006;Fu et al, 2007a,b;Li et al, 2007Li et al, , 2009Guan et al, 2008;Duan et al, 2009), so it is speculated that there may be differences between two strains in manners in response to exhaustive exercise. Therefore, the aims of the present study were: 1) to provide baseline hematological information in 'all-fish' growth hormone transgenic carp and 2) to assess if and how the hematological patterns for transgenic carp in response to exhaustive exercise are modified compared to controls.…”

Integration mechanisms of transgenes and population fitness of GH transgenic fish

“…The highest swimming speed of any fish species determines their ability to survive in a natural environment [28]. Some work has indicated that GH-transgenic common carp and salmon juveniles are inferior swimmers with significantly decreased critical swimming speeds compared with control fish of the same size [29,30]. This may affect the ability of the transgenics to escape under the threat of predators.…”

Metabolism traits of ‘all-fish’ growth hormone transgenic common carp (Cyprinus carpio L.)

“…Several pleiotropic effects of transgenic GH genes have been reported in fish, such as changing the non-specific immune functions (Wang et al, 2006b), impairing swimming ability (Farrell et al, 1997;Li et al, 2007), skeletal abnormalities (Ostenfeld et al, 1998), and regulating sea water adaptability (Seddiki et al, 1996). Accordingly, the fitness and adaptability of transgenic fish must be carefully predicted before introduction to a natural ecosystem in order to conserve ecological balance and minimize potential ecological risk.…”