Chaperons expressions and search for new gravity-related genes in the embryos of crabs and amphibians

Molecular mechanism of influence of gravity on living system is a subject of controversy for many years. Influence of gravity directly or indirectly affects to wide variety of biological processes, including biological clocks and general patterns in development of vertebrates and invertebrates. cDNA subtraction method was used for detection of the genes related to the hatching of the embryos semi-terrestrial crab Chiromantes haematocheir. Timing of the hatching of the embryos is highly synchronized with Moon phase and tides. While no new genes were found, we found that expression of chaperon hsp-90 increase in the embryos within two days before hatching, while expression of other stress proteins doesn't show any significant difference. Another model we used -- is a development of amphibian embryos. In order to clarify the effect of high gravity environment on development of Xenopus laevis, embryos on several developmental stages were subjected to the short-time high-gravity pulses (3G, 5G, and 9G). Analysis of stress-protein expression level and cDNA subtraction among high-gravity stressed embryos and control group revealed some changes in level of RNA expression of stress-proteins in experimental group. At the same time, we found two new genes expressed exclusively in the embryos under high gravity stress. The expression of the genes dramatically increased within several hours after the gravity stress, while the expression of the typical chaperons showed just slight difference. The genes expression pattern and its comparison with previously reported chaperons let us assume the presence physiological mechanism of specific gravity-stress response using previously unreported, special type of chaperons.