Muscle actin genes and muscle cells in the appendicularian, Oikopleura longicauda: phylogenetic relationships among muscle tissues in the urochordates.

Appendicularians (larvaceans) are planktonic tunicates. They possess a tail throughout their life, which marks a distinct difference between appendicularians and the other tunicate groups, including salps, doliolids, pyrosomes, and ascidians. We isolated cDNA clones encoding muscle-type and cytoplasmic-type actin isoforms from the appendicularian, Oikopleura longicauda. The types of the actin isoforms were confirmed by amino acid identities in the diagnostic residues compared to those of the other chordate muscle and cytoplasmic actins. Interestingly the appendicularian muscle actin isoform sequence has an intermediate feature between the ascidian tail (larval) muscle actin isoform and the body-wall (adult) muscle actin isoform. Analysis of a genomic clone from a muscle actin gene revealed that it contains only one intron in the coding region. It is located at a position that does not correspond to those of any introns reported in other deuterostome actin genes. Whole-mount in situ hybridization shows that the muscle actin transcript is detected specifically in the tail muscle cells of late tailbud-stage embryos. A signal is also found transiently in the region where the heart will form. In adults, the gene is expressed in tail muscle cells but not in the heart. Together with results of cytochemical and histochemical studies demonstrating the structure of muscle tissue, the present study highlights characteristics of appendicularian muscle organization, which are compared with those of the larval and adult muscle of ascidians.