{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,9,11]],"date-time":"2026-09-11T15:29:37Z","timestamp":1789140577299,"version":"build-2803163510"},"reference-count":45,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"1","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2020,1,3]],"date-time":"2020-01-03T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1578009600000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"funder":[{"DOI":"10.13039\/501100010813","name":"Administration of Ocean and Fisheries of Guangdong Province","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","award":["YCN2017-17\uff1b2014B020204004\uff1b2017B020218004"],"award-info":[{"award-number":["YCN2017-17\uff1b2014B020204004\uff1b2017B020218004"]}],"id":[{"id":"10.13039\/501100010813","id-type":"DOI","asserted-by":"publisher"}]}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Biomolecules"],"abstract":"<jats:p>The bacterial diseases of tilapia caused by Streptococcus agalactiae have resulted in the high mortality and huge economic loss in the tilapia industry. Matrix metalloproteinase-9 (MMP-9) may play an important role in fighting infection. However, the role of MMP-9 in Nile tilapia against S. agalactiae is still unclear. In this work, MMP-9 cDNA of Nile tilapia (NtMMP-9) has been cloned and characterized. NtMMP-9 has 2043 bp and encodes a putative protein of 680 amino acids. NtMMP-9 contains the conserved domains interacting with decorin and inhibitors via binding forces compared to those in other teleosts. Quantitative real-time-polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) analysis reveals that NtMMP-9 distinctly upregulated following S. agalactiae infection in a tissue- and time-dependent response pattern, and the tissues, including liver, spleen, and intestines, are the major organs against a S. agalactiae infection. Besides, the proteolytic activity of NtMMP-9 is also confirmed by heterologous expression and zymography, which proves the active function of NtMMP-9 interacting with other factors. The findings indicate that NtMMP-9 was involved in immune responses against the bacterial challenge at the transcriptional level. Further work will focus on the molecular mechanisms of NtMMP-9 to respond and modulate the signaling pathways in Nile tilapia against S. agalactiae invasion and the development of NtMMP-9-related predictive biomarkers or vaccines for preventing bacterial infection in the tilapia industry.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/biom10010076","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2020,1,3]],"date-time":"2020-01-03T11:55:07Z","timestamp":1578052507000},"page":"76","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":12,"title":["Characterization of Matrix Metalloprotease-9 Gene from Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) and Its High-Level Expression Induced by the Streptococcus agalactiae Challenge"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"10","author":[{"given":"Fu-Rui","family":"Liang","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Marine Resources and Coastal Engineering, School of Marine Sciences, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou 510006, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Qin-Qing","family":"Wang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Marine Resources and Coastal Engineering, School of Marine Sciences, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou 510006, China"},{"name":"Southern Marine Science and Engineering Guangdong Laboratory (Zhuhai), Zhuhai 519000, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Yun-Lin","family":"Jiang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Marine Resources and Coastal Engineering, School of Marine Sciences, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou 510006, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Bei-Ying","family":"Yue","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Marine Resources and Coastal Engineering, School of Marine Sciences, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou 510006, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-2756-1727","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Qian-Zhi","family":"Zhou","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Marine Resources and Coastal Engineering, School of Marine Sciences, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou 510006, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-5604-805X","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Jiang-Hai","family":"Wang","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Marine Resources and Coastal Engineering, School of Marine Sciences, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou 510006, China"},{"name":"Southern Marine Science and Engineering Guangdong Laboratory (Zhuhai), Zhuhai 519000, China"},{"name":"South China Sea Bioresource Exploitation and Utilization Collaborative Innovation Center, School of Marine Sciences, Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou 510006, China"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2020,1,3]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","first-page":"321","article-title":"Matrix metalloproteinases in parasitic infections","volume":"Volume 14","author":"Chakraborti","year":"2017","journal-title":"Pathophysiological Aspects of Proteases"},{"key":"ref_2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1122","DOI":"10.1016\/j.chembiol.2015.07.008","article-title":"High-throughput multiplexed peptide-centric profiling illustrates both substrate cleavage redundancy and specificity in the MMP family","volume":"22","author":"Kukreja","year":"2015","journal-title":"Chem. 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