Evolutional Study of Photo-Reception and Photo-Signal Transduction Systems of Animal.

为了弄清动物的光接受系统之间的进化关系，我们研究了几种不同物种的光接受色素和光信号转导蛋白，特别是低等无脊椎动物如扁虫和水母。这个研究项目的目的是了解动物视觉系统的进化途径。结果如下：1)克隆了水母视蛋白全长基因并进行了测序。从小鼠身上获得了抗c端合成肽的血清。northern blot分析和光镜、电镜免疫组化研究证实该基因在眼内独占表达。2)从涡虫眼中克隆Gq和Go类G蛋白α亚基基因。原位杂交分析显示，Gq类G蛋白在涡虫眼中高度表达。gq特异性抗血清免疫组化研究也证实了这一结果。基于以上结果，可以肯定地说，在涡虫视觉系统中，视紫红质与Gq类G蛋白偶联，表明视紫红质与Gq的偶联很早。3)从家蚕幼虫的大脑和细胞（茎）中克隆了视蛋白基因。大脑和细胞cDNA克隆的核苷酸序列相同，表明两个器官使用了相同的视蛋白。根据cDNA克隆核苷酸序列合成的c端肽抗血清与家蚕幼虫细胞发生交叉反应。

In order to clearify the evoulutional relationship among the photoreception systems of the animal, we investigated the photoreceptor pigment and the photo-signaltransducing protein of several dififerent species, especially lower invertebrate such as flatworm and jellyfish. The goat of this research project is to understand the evolutional pathway of the visual system of animals. The results were as follows :1) The full length opsin gene of jellyfish was cloned and sequenced. The anti-serum against the C-teminal synthetic peptides of the deduced sequence was obtained from mice. It was confirmed by northern blot analysis and immuno-histochmical studies with light and electron microscope that the gene was exclusively expressed in the eye.2) From the planariarn eye, Gq and Go class G protein alpha subunit gene were cloned. Insitu hybridization analysis revealed that Gq class of G protein was highly expressed in the planarian eye. The results were also confirmed by the immunohistochemical studies with the Gq-specific antiserum. Based on the above results, it can be safely said that in the planarian visual system rhodopsin couples with Gq class G protein, indicating that the coupling between rhodopsin and Gq was very old.3) The opsin gene was cloned from the brain and ocellus (stemma) of Bombyx larva. The nucleotide sequence was the same in both cDNA clones from brain and that from ocellus, indicating that the same opsin protein was used in the both organs. The antiserum against the C-terminal peptide synthesized according to the nucleotide sequence of the cDNA clone crossreacted with the ocellus of Bombyx larva.