Identification and characterization of microRNAs in white and brown alpaca skin

BMC Genomics

Research Article

Junping He¹  Ruiwen Fan¹  Xiaoyan He¹  Yunfei Song¹  Xue Tian¹  Jianjun Geng¹  Hongquan Li¹  Haidong Wang¹  Xiuju Yu¹  Changsheng Dong¹  Xiaolin Meng¹  Danli Zhang¹  Junbing Jiang¹  Jianbo Yao²  George W Smith³ 

[1] College of Animal Science and Technology, Shanxi Agricultural University, 030801, Taigu, People's Republic of China;College of Animal Science and Technology, Shanxi Agricultural University, 030801, Taigu, People's Republic of China;Division of Animal and Nutritional Sciences, Laboratory of Animal Biotechnology and Genomics, West Virginia University, 26506, Morgantown, WV, USA;College of Animal Science and Technology, Shanxi Agricultural University, 030801, Taigu, People's Republic of China;Laboratory of Mammalian Reproductive Biology and Genomics, Departments of Animal Science and Physiology, Michigan State University, 48824, East Lansing, MI, USA;

关键词: Alpaca;    MicroRNAs;    Deep sequencing;    Coat color;    Skin;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1471-2164-13-555

 received in 2012-04-09, accepted in 2012-10-08,  发布年份 2012

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundMicroRNAs (miRNAs) are small, non-coding 21–25 nt RNA molecules that play an important role in regulating gene expression. Little is known about the expression profiles and functions of miRNAs in skin and their role in pigmentation. Alpacas have more than 22 natural coat colors, more than any other fiber producing species. To better understand the role of miRNAs in control of coat color we performed a comprehensive analysis of miRNA expression profiles in skin of white versus brown alpacas.ResultsTwo small RNA libraries from white alpaca (WA) and brown alpaca (BA) skin were sequenced with the aid of Illumina sequencing technology. 272 and 267 conserved miRNAs were obtained from the WA and BA skin libraries, respectively. Of these conserved miRNAs, 35 and 13 were more abundant in WA and BA skin, respectively. The targets of these miRNAs were predicted and grouped based on Gene Ontology and KEGG pathway analysis. Many predicted target genes for these miRNAs are involved in the melanogenesis pathway controlling pigmentation. In addition to the conserved miRNAs, we also obtained 22 potentially novel miRNAs from the WA and BA skin libraries.ConclusionThis study represents the first comprehensive survey of miRNAs expressed in skin of animals of different coat colors by deep sequencing analysis. We discovered a collection of miRNAs that are differentially expressed in WA and BA skin. The results suggest important potential functions of miRNAs in coat color regulation.

【 授权许可】

Unknown   
© Tian et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2012. This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License(http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.