Sexual differentiation and maintenance of masculinity in crustaceans have been suggested to be regulated by IAG. However, downstream elements involved in the signaling cascade remained unknown. O. Sharabi and his colleges performed long-term RNA interference (RNAi) silencing in young male prawns to investigate the function of M. rosenbergii insulin receptor (Mr-IR). They found that the silencing of Mr-IR advanced the appearance of a male-specific secondary trait but had no effect on growth. The most noted effects of Mr-IR's silencing were hypertrophy of the AG and the associated increased production of Mr-IAG. These results suggested a role of Mr-IR in the regulation of the AG and implied sexual differentiation in crustaceans involving more than a single Mr-IAG receptor, which emphasized the complexity of sexual differentiation and maintenance . The pivotal protein in any insulin family-based signaling pathway is the insulin receptor that is responsible for mediating the signal carried by insulin-like peptides (ILPs) from the intercellular to the intracellular environment. In the present study, a total of three Es-IRs were identified for the first time in the AG comprehensive transcriptomic library.