Distribution of aquaporin genes and selection of individual reference genes for quantitative real-time RT-PCR analysis in multiple tissues of the mouse.

Aquaporins (AQPs) are a family of water-transporting proteins that are selectively expressed in epithelial, endothelial, and many other cell types of various tissues, where they play important physiological functions. However, the accurate distribution of AQP gene expression has not yet been examined in various tissues of the mouse. We first evaluated the tissue distribution of AQP gene expression using tongue, nasal epithelium, bronchus, trachea, lung, esophagus, stomach, ileum, transverse colon, liver, pancreas, whole blood, thigh muscle, spinal cord, brain, thoracic aorta, heart, kidney, thymus, spleen, skin, eye, and testis of the mouse. Furthermore, for a quantitative analysis, we selected appropriate reference genes for normalized qRT-PCR data in various tissues. The stability of the reference genes was assessed using NormFinder. The stably expressed genes identified in the present study were 18s rRNA. When 18s rRNA was used, as the best reference gene in the present study, the genes for AQPs 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 11, and 12 were notably expressed in the eye, lung, testis, eye, spinal cord, trachea, kidney, testis, testis, testis, testis, and pancreas. These results, regarding the distribution of AQPs, suggest that AQPs may be involved in various physiological and pathophysiological processes.