Comparative transcriptome analysis of trout skin pigment cells

Enormous variability in skin colour and patterning is a characteristic of teleost fish, including Salmonidae fishes, which present themselves as a suitable model for studying mechanisms of pigment patterning. In order to screen for candidate genes potentially involved in the specific skin pigment pattern in marble trout (labyrinthine skin pattern) and brown trout (spotted skin pattern), we conducted comparative transcriptome analysis between differently pigmented dermis sections of the adult skin of the two species.