Abstract
BackgroundThe common marmoset monkey (Callithrix jacchus), a small non-endangered New World primate native to eastern Brazil, is becoming increasingly used as a non-human primate model in biomedical research, drug development and safety assessment. In contrast to the growing interest for the marmoset as an animal model, the molecular tools for genetic analysis are extremely limited.ResultsHere we report the development of the first marmoset-specific oligonucleotide microarray (EUMAMA) containing probe sets targeting 1541 different marmoset transcripts expressed in hippocampus. These 1541 transcripts represent a wide variety of different functional gene classes. Hybridisation of the marmoset microarray with labelled RNA from hippocampus, cortex and a panel of 7 different peripheral tissues resulted in high detection rates of 85% in the neuronal tissues and on average 70% in the non-neuronal tissues. The expression profiles of the 2 neuronal tissues, hippocampus and cortex, were highly similar, as indicated by a correlation coefficient of 0.96. Several transcripts with a tissue-specific pattern of expression were identified. Besides the marmoset microarray we have generated 3215 ESTs derived from marmoset hippocampus, which have been annotated and submitted to GenBank [GenBank: EF214838 – EF215447, EH380242 – EH382846].ConclusionWe have generated the first marmoset-specific DNA microarray and demonstrated its use to characterise large-scale gene expression profiles of hippocampus but also of other neuronal and non-neuronal tissues. In addition, we have generated a large collection of ESTs of marmoset origin, which are now available in the public domain. These new tools will facilitate molecular genetic research into this non-human primate animal model.
Highlights
The common marmoset monkey (Callithrix jacchus), a small non-endangered New World primate native to eastern Brazil, is becoming increasingly used as a non-human primate model in biomedical research, drug development and safety assessment
A remaining 292 sequences could be confidently assigned with gene names by mapping to the human genome or crossspecies mapping. Of these 2542 (2250 + 292) sequences assigned with a gene name, 610 (19%) sequences could be annotated with an open reading frame (ORF) (Figure 1A)
These ORF-containing sequences were submitted to GenBank [GenBank: EF214838 – EF215447]
Summary
The common marmoset monkey (Callithrix jacchus), a small non-endangered New World primate native to eastern Brazil, is becoming increasingly used as a non-human primate model in biomedical research, drug development and safety assessment. Their close genetic, physiological and metabolic similarity to humans and several unique physiological differences between Old World and New World primates, underlie its widespread use as an animal model in studies involving aspects of infectious disease, stem cell research, neural and cognitive sciences, toxicology and drug development and reproductive biology. To allow gene expression profiling of different marmoset organs and delineation of complex biological pathways, we have developed a marmoset-specific DNA microarray, called EUMAMA (EUropean MArmoset MicroArray) starting from large scale EST sequencing of marmoset transcripts to generate the required sequence information
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