IHB Prof. XIE Shouqi interacted with Prof. Mark Alexander Sheridant

The presentation was mainly about the factors that regulated fish growth. Under different genetic background, fish growth was not only affected by endogenous factors such as nutrition and reproduction, but also by external environment factors such as water temperature and photoperiod. The endocrine regulation of fish growth was based on growth hormone (GH) - insulin-like growth factor (IGF) axis.  

Professor Sheridant suggested that there were two aspects of regulations in fish growth. One was blood hormone level variations including GH and IGF-Ⅰ, which were regulated by pituitary and liver respectively. The other was the sensitivity variation of target tissues to specific hormone, including the change of receptor type, quantity and signal transduction pathways. These two ways of regulations combined together enabled fish organs to adapt specific growth period such as in breeding seasons.  

Dr. Sheridant is a Jordan A. Engberg Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at North Dakota State University. Dr. Sheridan’s research on hormone biology has been supported by NSF, NIH, and USDA.  He has given scores of presentations at scientific meetings and has been a visiting professor at several universities around the world, including Brazil, Hong Kong, Japan, and Sweden.  He currently serves as an editor/associate editor for four scientific journals: Comparative Biochemistry and Physiology, Frontiers in Endocrinology, General and Comparative Endocrinology, International Journal of Endocrinology.