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HEREDITARY FACTOR VII DEFICIENCY IN THE ASIAN ELEPHANT (ELEPHAS MAXIMUS) CAUSED BY A F7 MISSENSE MUTATION.

ABSTRACT: Hereditary disorders and genetic predispositions to disease are rarely reported in captive and free-ranging wildlife, and none have been definitively identified and characterized in elephants. A wild-caught, 41-yr-old male Asian elephant ( Elephas maximus ) without an apparent increased bleeding tendency was consistently found to have prolonged prothrombin times (PTs, mean=55±35 s) compared to 17 other elephants (PT=10±2 s). This elephant's partial thromboplastin times (PTT) fell within the normal range of the other elephants (12-30 s). A prolonged PT in the presence of a normal PTT suggests disruption of the extrinsic pathway via deficiency of coagulation Factor VII (FVII). This elephant's plasma FVII activity was very low (2%) compared to that of 15 other elephants (57-80%), but other coagulation factors' activities did not differ from the control elephants. Sequencing of genomic DNA from ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid blood revealed a single homozygous point mutation (c.202A>G) in the F7 gene of the FVII deficient elephant that was not present in unrelated elephants. This mutation causes an amino acid substitution (p.Arg68Gly) that is predicted to be deleterious. Two living offspring of the affected elephant were heterozygous for the mutation and had normal plasma FVII activities and coagulation profiles. Tissue from a third offspring, a deceased calf, was utilized to show that it was also a heterozygote. A DNA test has been developed to enable the screening of additional elephants for this mutation. Consistent with FVII deficiency investigations in other species, the condition did not cause a serious bleeding tendency in this individual elephant.

SUBMITTER: Lynch M

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5383509 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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HEREDITARY FACTOR VII DEFICIENCY IN THE ASIAN ELEPHANT (ELEPHAS MAXIMUS) CAUSED BY A F7 MISSENSE MUTATION.

Lynch Michael M McGrath Ken K Raj Karthik K McLaren Philippa P Payne Karen K McCoy Richard R Giger Urs U

Journal of wildlife diseases 20170124 2

Hereditary disorders and genetic predispositions to disease are rarely reported in captive and free-ranging wildlife, and none have been definitively identified and characterized in elephants. A wild-caught, 41-yr-old male Asian elephant ( Elephas maximus ) without an apparent increased bleeding tendency was consistently found to have prolonged prothrombin times (PTs, mean=55±35 s) compared to 17 other elephants (PT=10±2 s). This elephant's partial thromboplastin times (PTT) fell within the norm ...[more]

PMID: 28118558

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Project description:BackgroundPrimary cultures from Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) allow scientists to obtain representative cells that have conserved most of their original characteristics, function, physiology and biochemistry. This technique has thus gained significant importance as a foundation for further cellular, cell biology and molecular research. Therefore, the aim of this study was to describe conditions for the successful establishment of primary adult fibroblasts from Asian elephant carcasses.MethodsEar tissue sample collection from Asian elephant carcasses and our recommendations are given. We describe here a simple modified protocol for successful isolation and maintenance of primary adult fibroblasts from elephant ear skin. Ear samples from each individual (five 3 × 3 cm2 pieces) were brought to the laboratory within 3 h after collection, kept in transportation medium at 0-4 °C. The ear tissues were prepared by a combination of 10% collagenase type II digestion procedure together with a simple explant procedure. Primary fibroblasts were cultured at 37 °C in Dulbecco's modified Eagle's medium (DMEM) with 20% fetal calf serum (FCS) in a humidified atmosphere containing 5% CO2. After the third passage, fibroblasts were routinely trypsinized with 0.25% trypsin/EDTA and cultured in DMEM with 10% FCS at 37 °C and 5% CO2. Traditional cell counting method was used to measure cell viability and growth curve. Long-term storage of cells used freezing medium consisting of 40% FCS (v/v).ResultsWe explored the most suitable conditions during sample collection (post-mortem storage time and sample storage temperature), which is the most important step in determining primary outgrowth. Our study successfully established and cultured primary adult skin fibroblasts obtained from post-mortem E. maximus ear skin tissues from six carcasses, with a success rate of around 83.3%. Outgrowth could be seen 4-12 days after explantation, and epithelial-like cells were found after 4-7 days of culture, while fibroblasts appeared at around day 7-10. The fibroblasts had viability and post-freezing recovery rates of around 97.3 ± 4.3% and 95.5 ± 7.3%, respectively, and doubling time was about 25 h (passage 6).DiscussionTo our knowledge, this report is the first to describe primary cell cultures derived from adult Asian elephant skin. Future studies should benefit from the information and useful suggestions herein, which may be used as a standard method for establishing primary skin fibroblast cultures in future experiments.

Dataset Information

HEREDITARY FACTOR VII DEFICIENCY IN THE ASIAN ELEPHANT (ELEPHAS MAXIMUS) CAUSED BY A F7 MISSENSE MUTATION.

Publications

HEREDITARY FACTOR VII DEFICIENCY IN THE ASIAN ELEPHANT (ELEPHAS MAXIMUS) CAUSED BY A F7 MISSENSE MUTATION.

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