While the importance of maternal effects has long been appreciated, a growing body of evidence now points to the paternal environment having an important influence on offspring phenotype. Indeed, research on rodent models suggests that paternal stress leaves an imprint on the behaviour and physiology of offspring via nongenetic information carried in the spermatozoa; however, fish have been understudied with regard to these sperm‐mediated effects. Here, we investigated whether the zebrafish was subjected to heritable influences of paternal stress by exposing males to stressors (conspecific‐derived alarm cue, chasing and bright light) before mating and assessing the behavioural and endocrine responses of their offspring, including their behavioural response to conspecific‐derived alarm cue. We found that after males are exposed to stress, their larval offspring show weakened responses to stressors. Small RNA sequencing subsequently revealed that the levels of several small noncoding RNAs, including microRNAs, PIWI‐interacting RNAs and tRNA‐derived small RNAs, were altered in the spermatozoa of stressed fathers, suggesting that stress‐induced alterations to the spermatozoal RNA landscape may contribute to shaping offspring phenotype. The work demonstrates that paternal stress should not be overlooked as a source of phenotypic variation and that spermatozoal small RNAs may be important intergenerational messengers in fish.

中文翻译：

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在野生型斑马鱼中的父本效应暗示了精子衍生的小RNA的作用。

尽管人们一直很清楚母体效应的重要性，但现在越来越多的证据表明，母体环境对后代表型具有重要影响。确实，对啮齿动物模型的研究表明，父亲的压力通过精子中携带的非遗传信息给后代的行为和生理留下了烙印。但是，关于这些精子介导的作用，人们对鱼类的研究还不足。在这里，我们研究了斑马鱼是否在父系交配之前通过将雄性暴露于应激源（特定来源的警报提示，追逐和明亮的光线），并评估其后代的行为和内分泌反应，包括其对行为的反应而受到父系压力的遗传影响。特定的警报提示。我们发现，在雄性受到压力后，他们的幼虫后代对应激源的反应减弱。小RNA测序随后显示，在压力较大的父亲的精子中，几种微小的非编码RNA的水平发生了变化，包括microRNA，PIWI相互作用的RNA和tRNA衍生的小RNA的水平发生了变化，这表明压力引起的精子体RNA格局的改变可能有助于塑造后代表型。这项研究表明，不应将父系压力作为表型变异的来源，而精子小RNA可能是鱼类重要的代际信使。应激父亲的精子发生了改变，这表明应激诱导的精子RNA格局的改变可能有助于塑造后代的表型。这项研究表明，不应将父系压力作为表型变异的来源，而精子小RNA可能是鱼类重要的代际信使。应激父亲的精子发生了改变，这表明应激诱导的精子RNA格局的改变可能有助于塑造后代的表型。这项研究表明，不应将父系压力作为表型变异的来源，而精子小RNA可能是鱼类重要的代际信使。