Avian stanniocalcin-2 is expressed in developing striated muscle and joints

The glycoprotein hormone stanniocalcin (STC) has originally been described in the teleost kidney. Since then, STC homologs have been identified in various genomes including human, mouse, rat, Xenopus and zebrafish. In mammals, two STC genes, STC1 and STC2, are known. We cloned a chicken STC homolog to analyze its expression pattern during chick development. Sequence analyses revealed a high sequence similarity of the chicken STC (cSTC) clone to mammalian STC2. Interestingly the expression pattern of cSTC2 largely resembles those of murine STC1: we found expression of cSTC2 in the nephric tubules, in the myocardium, in skeletal muscle cells from the onset of differentiation, and in synovial joint anlagen of the limbs.