Evaluating the effect of pollution with cytochrome p450 genes: Tissue and/or family type?
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Pollution is a global scale problem and is particularly relevant in inland waters, given that a large part of human activities take place around them. Organisms inhabiting polluted environments have developed adaptive and plastic responses as a result of these conditions. In this context, cytochrome p450 (CYP) gene families are very important, and can encode proteins that metabolize both endogenous and exogenous compounds, the latter being the most studied in the context of pollution, although both have shown changes in their expression under these conditions. The Maipo River basin in Chile is one of the most affected by domestic and agricultural pollution. In this basin inhabits the silverside endemic to Chile Basilichthys microlepidotus, in which adaptive and plastic responses to pollution have been detected. The objective of the present study was to determine differential expression (from RNA-seq data) of endogenous and exogenous CYP genes in liver and gills of B. microlepidotus under pollution conditions in the Maipo River basin. It was observed that CYP genes from families related to endogenous compounds are differentially expressed in the liver, while those from families related to exogenous compounds are differentially expressed in the gills. Our results indicate that when monitoring the effects of pollution with CYP genes it is necessary to take into account the organ and also the type of family to which the gene belongs.