De Novo Assembly, Characterization and Comparative Transcriptome Analysis of the Mature Gonads in Megalobrama terminalis

<i>Megalobrama terminalis</i> is a significant aquatic fish in South China, renowned for its tasty meat. Nonetheless, related studies are deficient concerning the gonadal development of <i>M. terminalis</i>. This paper presents the first comparative transcriptome analysis of the gonads of female and male <i>M. terminalis</i>. A total of 84,886 unigenes were assembled, with 42,322 effectively annotated to the Nr, SwissProt, KEGG, KOG, and GO databases. Furthermore, comparative transcriptomic analysis of <i>M. terminalis</i> was conducted to examine its gonadal development. A total of 14,972 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were discovered. In the testis, the expression of 11,928 unigenes was significantly upregulated, while 3044 were significantly downregulated. Numerous DEGs associated with steroidogenesis, gonadal differentiation and development, and gametogenesis in teleost fish were identified. The results provide empirical support for further study of genes and pathways associated with sex determination and gonadal differentiation in teleost fish.