Cortisol is the main glucocorticoid in fish and the hormone most directly associated with stress. Recent research suggests that this hormone may act as a key factor linking social environmental stimuli and the onset of sex change by initiating a shift in steroidogenesis from estrogens to androgens. For many teleost fish, sex change occurs as a usual part of the life cycle. Changing sex is known to enhance the lifetime reproductive success of these fish and the modifications involved (behavioral, gonadal, morphological) are well studied. However, the exact mechanism behind the transduction of the environmental signals into the molecular cascade that underlies this singular process remains largely unknown. We here synthesize current knowledge regarding the role of cortisol in teleost sex change with a focus in two well described transformations: temperature-induced masculinization and socially-regulated sex change. Three non-mutually exclusive pathways are considered when describing the potential role of cortisol in mediating teleost sex change: cross-talk between glucocorticoid and androgen pathways, inhibition of aromatase expression and upregulation of amh (the gene encoding anti-Müllerian hormone). We anticipate that understanding the role of cortisol in the initial stages of sex change will further improve our understanding of sex determination and differentiation across vertebrates, and may lead to new tools to control fish sex ratios in aquaculture.
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 73. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 21 December 2021.
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#704,855
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Altmetric has tracked 32,455,005 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done particularly well and is in the 97th percentile: it's in the top 5% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 2,196 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a little more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 6.8. This one has done particularly well, scoring higher than 98% of its peers.
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We're also able to compare this research output to 55 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has done particularly well, scoring higher than 98% of its contemporaries.
