Acuigen, genetics for aquaculture and conservation biological resources

Interests

My interests in research have focused on the genetics of fishes: cytogenetic, chromosomal manipulation, gynogenetic, triploid. Linkage maps with molecular markers: microsatellites, AFLPs, SNPs. Sequences associated with sex. Conservation genetics and comparative genomics.

Recently the Zefrafish Laboratory has been established for  the study of the genetic basis of several traits of interest in aquaculture (sex determination, disease resistance and growth). The zebrafish is a model organism with large applications in biomedicine, and this led to the beginning of a line of research for in vivo assays with this model organism, allowing the formation of the group Preclinical Animal Models of IDIS (Institute for Health Research Santiago de Compostela). Currently xenografts of tumor cells are been performed for determining cancer personalized treatments . The Zebra fish Lab is also specialized in toxicity analysis with different compounds and nanoparticles.

Selected publications

Guerra-Varela J., Cabezas-Sáinz P., Yebra-Pimentel E., Gutiérrez-Lovera C., Cedrón V.P., Otero Obarrio M.A.,  Sciara A.A., Rodríguez N., Araujo J., Millán A. & Sánchez L. 2016. “A zebra in the water”: Inspiring science in Spain. Zebrafish (submitted).

Cabezas-Sáinz P., Guerra-Varela J., Carreira M.J., Mariscal J., Roel M., Rubiolo J.A., Sciara A.A., Abal M., Botana L.M., López R. & Sánchez L. 2016. Zebrafish embryo xenotransplantation conditions improved: temperature and proliferation index through ZFtool image analysis software. PLoS One (submitted).

Penas C., Sánchez M.I., Guerra-Varela J., Sánchez L., Vázquez M.E. & Mascareñas J.L. 2016. Light-controlled celular internalization and cytotoxicity of nucleic acid-binding agents. Studies in vitro and in zebrafish embryos. ChemBioChem, 17: 37-41.

Robledo D., Ribas L., Cal R., Sánchez L., Piferrer F., Martínez P. & Viñas A. 2015. Gene expression analysis at the onset of sex differentiation in turbot (Scophthalmus maximus). BMC Genomics, 16: 973.

Vera M., Bello X., Álvarez-Dios J.A., Pardo B.G., Sánchez L., Carlsson J., Carlsson J.E.L., Carolina Bartolomé C., Maside X. & Martinez P. 2015. Screening of repetitive motifs inside the genome of the flat oyster (Ostrea edulis): Transposable elements and short tandem repeats. Marine Genomics, 24: 335-341.

Martínez P., Viñas A., Sánchez L., Díaz N., Ribas L., Piferrer F. 2014. Genetic architecture of sex determination in fish: applications to sex ratio control in aquaculture. Frontiers in Genetics. (DOI: 10.3389/fgene.2014.00340).

Robledo, D., Hernández-Urcera, J., Cal, R.M., Pardo, B.G., Sánchez, L., Martínez, P. & Viñas, A. 2014. Analysis of qPCR reference gene stability determination methods and a practical approach for efficiency calculation on a turbot (Scophthalmus maximus) gonad dataset. BMC Genomics 15: 648.

Vale L., Diéguez R., Sánchez L., Martínez, P. & Viñas 2014. A sex-associated sequence identified by RAPD screening in gynogenetic individuals of turbot (Scophthalmus maximus). Molecular Biology Reports 41(3):1501-1509.