Fig. 4

Relative gene expression of two initiator caspases, Cg2A and Cg8B, and four executioner caspases, Cg3/7, Cg3A, Cg3B, Cg3C, during Pacific oyster late larval development (14–17 days post fertilisation (dpf)), after 3 and 6 h post exposure start (3 hpe & 6 hpe) to a 3 h epinephrine (EPI) exposure at 10^− 4 M for metamorphosis induction, and in spat (24 hpe). Each gene expression profile is accompanied by a schematic representation of the key domains present in the protein sequence of the analysed caspase. Different lower-case letters represent significant differences with p < 0.05. CARD: caspase-recruitment domain, DED: death-effector domain, DD: death domain, Large p20: large caspase subunit p20, Small p10: small caspase subunit p10