Feed the Future Innovation Lab for Collaborative Research on Aquaculture & Fisheries

Human genes encoding passive transporters, ion-coupled transporters, and exchangers are all included in the so-called SoLute Carrier (SLC) gene series (the Human Genome Organization Gene Nomenclature Committee; http://www.genenames.org/), consisting of 51 families and at least 378 genes (http://www.bioparadigms.org). Ortholog genes encoding for transport proteins of the SLC series have comparatively been described in teleost fish, although their functional properties, in terms of kinetic parameters, substrate specificities, and inhibition patterns of the expressed transport proteins, have only sporadically been assessed in vitro. This chapter gives the latest updates for the SLC families and their members in teleost fish as well as relevant links to GenBank database and literature. By using a functional genomics approach, a list (version 1.0) of all currently known SLC families in teleost fish is provided in the form of SLC tables. 

The SoLute Carrier (SLC) gene family series encodes membrane transporters (Hediger et al. 2004). In humans, the SLC family series comprises 51 gene families having at least 378 functional protien-coding genes (http://www.bioparadigms.org). The gene products include passivetransporters (alias facilitated or facilitative transporters or uniporters), co-transporters (alias symporters), and exchangers (alias antiporters), located in all cellular and subcellular membranes (with the apparent exception of the nuclear membrane). Passive transporters move one molecule at a time down a concentration gradient. Conversely, active transporters couple the movement of one type of ion or molecule against its concentration gradient to the movement of another ion or molecule down its concentration gradient. In particular, a co-transporter moves the transported molecule or ion and the co-transported molecule or ion in the same direction across a membrane, while an exchanger moves the transported molecule or ion and the cotransported molecule or ion in opposite directions. Transported substrates include amino acids and oligopeptides, glucose and other sugars, inorganic cations and anions, bile salts, carboxylate and other organic anions, acetyl coenzyme A, essential metals, biogenic amines, neurotransmitters, vitamins, fatty acids and lipids, nucleosides, ammonium, choline, thyroid hormone and urea, and many other solutes.