is a commercially important fish species that is valued for its nutritive value and is used as a delicacy. It is widely distributed in the Yangtze River, coastal waters of China and Korea, and Ariake Sound in Japan. is highly responsive to stress, which often causes tissue damage, apoptosis, and ultimately death during loading and transport, hampering the development of this industry. Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptors (PPARs) are ligand-dependent transcription factors belonging to the nuclear receptor superfamily. Like other nuclear receptors, PPARs consist of four domains that have distinct functions. The A/B domain, located in conserved N-terminus, is responsible for ligand-independent transcription activity. The C domain, which is the DNA-binding domain (DBD), contains two zinc finger structures. The D domain, the hinge region, connects the DBD with the ligand-binding domain (LBD) and is involved in the conformational changes of PPARs. The E/F domain is an LBD. Transcriptional activation by PPARs requires the presence of PPAR response elements (PPREs) in the promoter of the target gene. PPARs bind PPREs as heterodimers with retinoid X receptor. Three isoforms of PPARs, , have been cloned in various mammals and fish. is involved in many processes such as ontogenesis, lipid metabolism regulation, peroxisome biogenesis, immune functions and inflammation, and oxidative stress. The aim of this study was to investigate the stress response and expression of PPARγ cDNA was obtained, which contained 1951 base pairs with an open reading frame of 1470 base pairs, encoding 489 amino acids. PPARγ has four functional domains, A/B region, DBD, hinge region, and LBD. Real-time quantitative PCR was used to detect the expression of in different tissues and under transport stress. The results showed that was expressed in all tissues, with the highest expression observed in the liver, relatively high expression detected in the brain, intestine, heart, kidney, head kidney, and muscle, and low expression in the gill and spleen. During transport stress, <0.05), peaked at 4 h, and was then significantly down-regulated. High expression of may increase lipid metabolism and relieve inflammation and apoptosis. plays an important role in lipid metabolism and stress responses. During embryonic development, shows the highest expression in the fertilized egg stage, after which its expression is rapidly decreased and then remains at a lower level. Lower expression of may down-regulate lipid metabolism and transportation. This study provides information regarding the theoretical basis of stress regulation.