Transcriptome Sequencing of the Pale Anemones (Exaiptasia diaphana) Revealed Functional Peptide Gene Resources of Sea Anemone

Sea anemone venom is a marine drug resource library with pharmacological and biotechnology value, and it contains complex and diverse functional peptide neurotoxins. However, the venom components of only a limited number of sea anemone species have been globally evaluated by transcriptomics and proteomics. In this study, 533 putative protein as well as peptide toxin sequences were found on a large scale from dissimilar developmental stages of sea anemone Exaiptasia diaphana , which can be divided into 75 known superfamilies according to the predicted functions. Among them, the proportion of protein is 72.98%, and its main families are metalloproteases, chymotrypsinogen like, collagen, pancreatic lipase-associated protein like, and G-protein coupled receptor, while the proportion of peptides is 27.02%, and main families are ShK domain, thrombin, Kunitz-type, defensin, as well as insulin-like peptide. Finally, typical anemone peptide neurotoxins were screened, and the 3D structure and pharmacological activity of these anemone peptide neurotoxins were predicted by homology modeling. We elucidate on a valuable high-throughput approach for obtaining sea anemone proteins and peptides. Our findings form the basis for targeted studies on the diversity as well as pharmacological effects of sea anemone peptide neurotoxins.