cDNA fingerprint from the hepatopancreatic glands of pond snails (Lymnaea stagnalis) exposed to benzo[a]pyrene

ebms229 revealed that only 3 out of 9 isolated ESTs had meaningful information on their putative nucleotide sequence identity.The highest similarity was scored for EST-A1, identified as the transcript of UAP-like protein, found to be up-regulated after B[a]P exposure.The original expression pattern that was observed in DD-PCR step was coherent with results of the qPCR verification for 3 out of 5 analyzed ESTs.However, changes in the ESTs expression were modest and the treatment with B[a]P resulted in significant down-regulation for only 1 unidentified fragment (EST-G42, almost 2-fold; p<0.05) when compared to untreated snails.Although no significant changes were observed for EST-A1 and EST-G42 in the validation study, their expression pattern was consistent with that obtained from DD-PCR.Surprisingly, EST-C5 remained in contrast to the DD-PCR part, but it showed significant down-regulation in group of snails exposed to 100µM B[a]P (3.5fold; p<0.05).The obtained results show that diverse genes may be involved in the molecular response of the pond snail's hepatopancreas to treatment with B[a]P.However, further research is needed to confirm the utility of the discovered EST as PAH biomarkers in biomonitoring practices with L. stagnalis as bioindicator species.