Project description:Examination the DNA methylation statues of the main subpopulation of Chinese Mongolian sheep. A high quality methylome of Chinese Mongolian sheep was obtained, and established a list of DMRs potentially association with sheep body size
Project description:The sheep (Ovis aries) plays a major socio-economic role in the world. Copy number variations (CNVs) are increasingly recognized as a key and potent source of genetic variation and phenotypic diversity, but little is known about the extent to which CNVs contribute to genetic variation in Chinese sheep breeds. Analyses of CNVs in the genomes of eight sheep breeds were performed using the sheep SNP50 BeadChip genotyping array. A total of 111 CNV regions (CNVRs) were obtained from 160 Chinese sheep breeds. These CNVRs covered 13.75 Mb of the sheep genome sequence. A total of 22 Go terms and 17 candidate genes were obtained from the functional analysis. Ten CNVRs were selected for validation, of which 7 CNVRs were further experimentally confirmed by quantitative PCR. Four candidate genes were selected to confirm the results of the functional analysis. These results provide a resource for furthering understanding of ruminant biology, and for further improving the genetic quality of sheep breeds.
Project description:Herein we present spatialtemporal profiles and performed a detailed data analysis in longissimum dorsi muscle of Chinese merino sheep at embryonic ages D85, D105, and D135. This is the first report of myogenic differentiaion and muscle fibre formation at the whole transcriptome level. The objective herein was to evaluate the whole transcriptome profiles and to develop an indepth and systematic understanding of molecular genetic controls underlying myofibre proliferation and differentiation in sheep. This report provides an effective reference for the study of non-coding RNA in other agricultural animals.
Project description:We carried out a cross species cattle-sheep array comparative genome hybridization (aCGH) experiment in order to identify copy number variations (CNVs) in the sheep genome analysing animals of Italian dairy breeds (Sarda, Bagnolese, Laticauda, Massese and Valle del Belice) using a tiling oligonucleotide array with ~385,000 probes designed on the bovine genome. We identified 135 CNV regions (CNVRs) covering about 10.5 Mb of the virtual sheep genome referred to the bovine genome (0.398%) with a mean and median equal to 77.6 kb and 55.9 kb, respectively. A comparative analysis between the identified sheep CNVRs and those reported in the cattle and goat genomes indicated that overlaps between sheep and goat and sheep and cattle CNVRs are highly significant (P<0.0001) suggesting that several chromosome regions might contain recurrent interspecies CNVRs. Many sheep CNVs affect genes with important biological functions. Further studies are needed to evaluate the functional relevance of these CNVs.
Project description:Body weight (BW) is a critical economic trait for meat production in sheep. The current study aimed to perform a genome-wide association study (GWAS) to detect significant single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) that are associated with BW in Hu sheep.
Project description:11,431 and 4,992 genes were determined in whole blood of healthy human volunteers and normal sheep, respectively following MPLA and LPS exposure Following the exposure 1,029 human and 175 sheep genes were differentially expressed. Of those 175 sheep genes, 54 had a known human ortolog. The major inflammatory mediators, such as IL-1-6-8, TNFa, NFkB, ETS2, PTGS2, PTX3, CXCL18, KYNU, and CLEC4E were similarly (>2-fold) upregulated in both human and sheep blood.
Project description:Texel and Ujumqin sheep show obvious differences in muscle and fat growth, so they are ideal models not only to understand the molecular mechanism in prenatal skeletal muscle development, but to identify the potential target genes of myostatin. To elucidate the phenotypic variation between the two sheep breeds and the dynamic characteristics of gene expression in skeletal muscle during the development, we examined the development of skeletal muscle in transcriptome-wide level at 70, 85,100,120 , 135 days post coitus (dpc),birth, 1 month and 2 month. Using the specialized and standardized sheep transcriptome-wide oligo DNA microarray (Agilent), we analyzed the transcriptomic profiles of longissmuss dorsi muscle from fetuses of Texel and Ujumqin sheep. We characterized dynamic transcriptome-wide profiles that accompany the prenatal skeletal muscle and fat development in Texel and Ujumqin sheep respectively, and compared the difference in profiles of gene expression between the two sheep breeds at the same developmental stage.Some potential myostatin target genes and other genes controlling the growth of skeletal muscle and adipose were identified for further examinations. Our findings not only contribute to understand the molecular mechanism of prenatal skeletal muscle development in large precocial species, but also provide some clues for human myopathy and obesity at prenatal stages. Moreover, we also can identify putative candidate genes for meat quality traits in farm animals.
Project description:Cystic Fibrosis (CF) is associated with pathology in multiple tissues including the lung, digestive tract and reproductive system. Lung disease is primarily a post-natal event but other organs are affected before birth. Here we use the CF sheep model to investigate the initiation and progression of CF disease through gestation.