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Female-Attracting Peptide Pheromone in Newt Cloacal Glands

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Advances in Chemical Signals in Vertebrates

Abstract

An attempt has been made to isolate and characterize the female-attracting pheromone in the abdominal glands of male red-bellied newts, Cynops pyrrhogaster. The active substance was isolated by two steps of purification using reverse-phase high-performance liquid chromatography. Direct sequencing of the final product revealed that it is a novel decapeptide. Its minimum effective concentration was estimated to be between 0.1 pM and 1.0 pM. The synthetic peptide showed a female-attracting activity similar to that of the native peptide. It acts through the olfactory organ of female newts. An immunoelectron microscopic study using the antiserum against sodefrin revealed that sodefrin exists predominantly within secretory granules in the epithelial cells of the abdominal glands. The immunoassayable sodefrin content in C. pyrrhogaster males was diminished by castration and hypophysectomy. The sodefrin level was increased markedly in the castrated and hypophysectomized newts after treatment with both testosterone and prolactin. Sequence analyses of sodefrin cDNA clones obtained from a C. ensicauda abdominal gland cDNA library revealed that the cDNA encoded a variant type of sodefrin peptide with substitutions of two amino acids. The synthetic sodefrin variant attracted C. ensicauda females but not C. pyrrhogaster females. These results indicate that the female-attracting pheromone differs between these two species of genus Cynops.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Biology, School of Education, Waseda University, Nishiwaseda, Tokyo, 169-50, Japan

    Sakae Kikuyama, Takeo Iwata, Noriyuki Takahashi & Kazutoshi Yamamoto

  2. Department of Physiology, Nara Medical University, Kashihara, 634, Japan

    Fumiyo Toyoda

  3. Gunma Prefectural College of Health Science, Maebashi, 371, Japan

    Hiroaki Hayashi

  4. RI Research Center, School of Medicine, Yokohama City University, Yokohama, 236, Japan

    Satoshi Miura

  5. Institute of Cellular and Molecular Regulation, Gunma University, Maebashi, 371, Japan

    Shigeyasu Tanaka

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  1. Sakae Kikuyama
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  2. Fumiyo Toyoda
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  3. Takeo Iwata
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  4. Noriyuki Takahashi
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  5. Kazutoshi Yamamoto
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  6. Hiroaki Hayashi
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  7. Satoshi Miura
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  8. Shigeyasu Tanaka
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Psychology, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, USA

    Robert E. Johnston

  2. College of Environmental Science and Forestry, State University of New York—Syracuse, Syracuse, New York, USA

    Dietland Müller-Schwarze

  3. Department of Fisheries and Wildlife, University of Minnesota—St. Paul, St. Paul, Minnesota, USA

    Peter W. Sorensen

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Kikuyama, S. et al. (1999). Female-Attracting Peptide Pheromone in Newt Cloacal Glands. In: Johnston, R.E., Müller-Schwarze, D., Sorensen, P.W. (eds) Advances in Chemical Signals in Vertebrates. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-4733-4_9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4615-4733-4_9

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Boston, MA

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  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4615-4733-4

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