Abstract：Aquaporins(AQPs) play importment roles in the water absorbing through gastrointestinal tract as channel proteins. The encoding sequences of aquaporins(AQP2~AQP11) were cloned from the gastrointestinal tract tissue of piglets(Sus scrofa), and then ran bioinformatics analysis. The GenBank accession numbers were EU636238, EU161094, EU165525, EU192130, EU620575, EU024116, EU220426, EU220427, EU582021 and EU220425, respectively. Eight piglets were divided randomly to control and weaning group. Mucosal tissue was collected from the gastrointestinal tract (stomach, duodenum, jejunum, ileum, colon and rectum) and Real-time PCR was applied to determine the mRNA expression of AQPs genes (AQP1, AQP3, AQP8 and AQP11). Bioinformatics software analysis showed that the AQPs had a conserved amino acid sequence of asparagine-proline-alanine(NPA) motif in the protein family. The gene expression results indicated that compared with the control group, mRNA expression of AQP1 was significantly up-regulated in the duodenum, ileum and colon tissue(P<0.05); mRNA expression of AQP3 was significantly up-regulated in the stomach and small intestine tissue(P<0.05); mRNA expression of AQP8 had no significantly difference in duodenum, jejunum, colon and rectum tissue, but up-regulated in the stomach and ileum tissue(P<0.01); The mRNA expression level of AQP11 was increased 1.7 fold in the jejunum tissue. These results suggested the AQPs gene may play a importment role in the regulation of diarrhea in the stomach and small intestines tissues of piglets during weaning-stress
