Regulation of the Expression of the Myosin Heavy Chain (MYH) Gene myh14 in Zebrafish Development

The human sarcomeric myosin heavy chain gene MYH14 contains an intronic microRNA, miR-499. Our previous studies demonstrated divergent genomic organization and expression patterns of myh14 /miR-499 among teleosts; however, the regulatory mechanism is partly known. In this study, we report the regulation of myh14 expression in zebrafish, Danio rerio . Zebrafish myh14 has three paralogs, myh14-1 , myh14-2 , and myh14-3 . Detailed promoter analysis suggested that a 5710-bp 5′-flanking region of myh14-1 and a 5641-bp region of myh14-3 contain a necessary regulatory region to recapitulate specific expression during embryonic development. The 5′-flanking region of zebrafish myh14-1 and its torafugu ortholog shared two distal and a single proximal conserved region. The two distal conserved regions had no effect on zebrafish myh14-1 expression, in contrast to torafugu expression, suggesting an alternative regulatory mechanism among the myh14 orthologs. Comparison among the 5′-flanking regions of the myh14 paralogs revealed two conserved regions. Deletion of these conserved regions significantly reduced the promoter activity of myh14-3 but had no effect on myh14-1 , indicating different cis -regulatory mechanisms of myh14 paralogs. Loss of function of miR-499 resulted in a marked reduction in slow muscle fibers in embryonic development. Our study identified different cis -regulatory mechanisms controlling the expression of myh14 /miR-499 and an indispensable role of miR-499 in muscle fiber–type specification in zebrafish.