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Role Of Sex Hormones In Sex Change Of Grouper, Masaru Nakamura, Mohammad Ashraful Alam, Yasuhisa Kobayashi, Ramji Kumar Bhandari

Journal of Marine Science and Technology

Groupers are commercially important coral reef fishes because of their excellent flavor and high price. Due to their sex changing nature, commercial aquaculture operations have not yet been developed for groupers. Sex steroids play a critical role in the initiation of sex change, but their exact function and mechanism of action are unknown. We have investigated the role of sex steroids in protogynous sex change using the honeycomb grouper, Epinephelus merra, for a number of years. Our studies have shown that sex steroids play a major role in sex change. In this review, we integrate our findings to better understand …