Project description:Improving the fertility of sheep is an important goal in sheep breeding as it greatly increases the productivity. Dolang sheep is a typical representative breed of lamb in Xinjiang and is the main local sheep breed and meat source in the region. To explore the genes associated with the initiation of puberty in Dolang sheep, the hypothalamic tissues of Dolang sheep prepubertal, pubertal, and postpubertal periods were collected for RNA-seq analysis on the Illumina platform.
Project description:Whole genome sequencing of CTVT, breed dogs, and wild canids reveals pathways that are important in cancer cell survival. Comparison of these mutations with breed dogs shows that the original tumor came from a dog very similar to one of the modern Arctic breeds. DNA was collected from pedigreed dogs of the Alaskan Malamute (AMAL) and Siberian Husky (HUSK) breeds living in North America. SNPs were genotyed using the Illumina CanineHD SNP chip. These SNPs were compared to published data and seqeunced mutations from CTVT by principal component alnalysis to identify the breed of the CTVT originator.
Project description:Our objective was to investigate differences in gene expression between 24 parasite-resistant hair and 24 susceptible wool lambs to determine genetic mechanisms involved in resistance to H. contortus. Half of the animals of each breed were infected and sacrificed at 3 or 27 days post-infection; the remaining animals were uninfected controls. Breed differences in abomasum and abomasal lymph node tissue gene expression were assessed using bovine cDNA microarrays. Over 60 transcripts differed between breeds for each tissue and infection status. Genes differentially expressed between hair and wool sheep 3 days PI were assessed for gene function and mechanisms for greater immune cell infiltration, abomasal tissue repair, Th17 response, and anticoagulation were present in parasite-resistant hair sheep. By 27 days PI, hair sheep had greater expression of genes involved in gut motility, inflammatory cytokines, and cell proliferation and differentiation compared to wool sheep. Changes in these processes indicate Caribbean hair sheep have a stronger inflammatory response when infected with H. contortus which may facilitate the increased parasite resistance observed in these sheep.
Project description:The Bashbay sheep (Ovis aries), an indigenous breed of Xinjiang, China, has many excellent characteristics. However, hybrids of Argali sheep and Bashbay sheep are susceptible to Mycoplasma ovipneumoniae infection, the causative agent of mycoplasma ovipneumonia, a chronic respiratory disease that is harmful to the sheep industry. To date, knowledge regarding the mechanisms responsible for M. ovipneumoniae pathogenesis is in scant. Herein, we report the results of transcriptome profiling of lung tissues from Argali hybrid sheep experimentally infected with an M. ovipneumoniae strain at 4 and 14 days post-infection, in comparison to mock-infected animals (0 d). Transcriptome profiling was performed by deep RNA sequencing, using the Illumina platform. The analysis of differentially expressed genes was performed to determine concomitant gene-specific temporal patterns of mRNA expression in the lungs after M. ovipneumoniae infection. We found 156 differentially expressed genes (44 up-regulated, 112 down-regulated) when comparing transcriptomic data at 4 and 0 days post-infection, and 367 (35 up-regulated, 332 down-regulated) when comparing 14 versus 0 days post-infection. Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes pathway analysis showed that the differentially expressed genes at 4 and 14 versus 0 days post-infection were enriched in 109 and 150 pathways, respectively, and the Primary immunodeficiency pathway was considered most closely related to MO infection (p < 0.01). Hyper-IgM syndrome was identified based on the B-cell immunodeficiency signaling pathway from differentially expressed genes related M. ovipneumoniae infection. Gene Ontology analysis showed that differentially expressed genes in different groups were enriched for 497 and 928 terms, where those most closely related to M. ovipneumoniae infection are ciliated motor damage (p < 0.01). These results could aid in understanding why the Argali hybrid sheep are susceptible to MO as well as how M. ovipneumoniae infection progresses in the lungs and may provide useful information regarding key regulatory pathways.
Project description:We report the application of single-molecule-based sequencing technology for high-throughput profiling of different ovine muscle's transcriptomes. 9.27 gigabases of sequence from two different breeds of sheep. Examination of 2 different muscle's transcriptomes in 2 breed types.
Project description:Sheep provide considerable materials for the animal fibre industry. Identifying genes of major effect for wool growth would offer strategies for improving the quality of fine wool. In this study, we employed Agilent Sheep Gene Expression Microarray and proteomic technology to investigate the gene expression patterns of body side skin between Aohan fine wool sheep and small tail Han sheep (two Chinese indigenous breed) at the anagen stage of wool follicle. Several potential gene families might participate in hair growth regulation, including fibroblast growth factors, transforming growth factor-β, WNTs, insulin-like growth factor, vascular endothelial growth factors and so on. Furthermore, according to the results at both mRNA and protein levels, similar regulation mechanism of gene activity might be engaged during skin development and embryo development.
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.