Methylation differences of the neuronatin gene promoter region in liver between normal and cloned pigs. (22nd July 2013)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Gu, Ting; Su, Xi; Zhao, Shuhong; Li, Changchun
• Is Part Of: Animal genetics. Volume 45:Number 1(2014:Feb.)
• Page Start: 122
• Page End: 124
• Publication Date: 2013-07-22
• Subjects: Animal genetics -- Periodicals; 572.8
• DOI: 10.1111/age.12074
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0268-9146

Abstract

<abstract abstract-type="main" id="age12074-abs-0001"> <title>Summary</title> <p>Abnormal phenotypes in cloned pigs can be partly due to changes in epigenetic modifications such as methylation levels of promoter CpG islands. <italic>Neuronatin</italic> is an imprinted gene, conserved in human, pig, cattle and mouse, which is expressed exclusively from the paternal allele. Three CpG islands located in the promoter region of the porcine <italic>neuronatin</italic> gene have the potential to regulate the gene expression by cytosine methylation. To illustrate whether <italic>neuronatin</italic> was differentially expressed among nuclear transfer macroglossia–positive and nuclear transfer macroglossia–negative pigs and <italic>in vitro‐</italic>fertilized pigs, we detected its expression level by qRT‐PCR and further quantified methylation levels by pyrosequencing DNA from the liver. The results showed that <italic>neuronatin</italic> was expressed at a significantly higher level in livers of nuclear transfer macroglossia‐positive pigs compared with normal cloned and <italic>in vitro</italic>‐fertilized pigs. Livers of nuclear transfer macroglossia‐positive pigs also had a significantly lower methylation level at CpG island 2 and CpG island 3 in the promoter region.</p> </abstract>