Abstract
The Qira black sheep and the Hetian sheep are two local breeds in the Northwest of China, which are characterized by high-fecundity and low-fecundity breed respectively. The elucidation of mRNA expression profiles in the ovaries among different sheep breeds representing fecundity extremes will helpful for identification and utilization of major prolificacy genes in sheep. In the present study, we performed RNA-seq technology to compare the difference in ovarian mRNA expression profiles between Qira black sheep and Hetian sheep. From the Qira black sheep and the Hetian sheep libraries, we obtained a total of 11,747,582 and 11,879,968 sequencing reads, respectively. After aligning to the reference sequences, the two libraries included 16,763 and 16,814 genes respectively. A total of 1,252 genes were significantly differentially expressed at Hetian sheep compared with Qira black sheep. Eight differentially expressed genes were randomly selected for validation by real-time RT-PCR. This study provides a basic data for future research of the sheep reproduction.
Highlights
Sheep are one of the important domestic animals in Xinjiang province in the northwest of China
41.99% of the reads in Qira black sheep and 43.81% of the reads in Hetian sheep could be mapped to reference genes, approximately 82% of the reads mapped to sheep genome (Qira black sheep with 82.39%, Hetian sheep with 82.42%)
33.76% of the reads in Qira black sheep and 34.65% of the reads in Hetian sheep could be perfectly matched to the reference genes, and approximately 65% of the reads perfectly matched to genome
Summary
Sheep are one of the important domestic animals in Xinjiang province in the northwest of China. High reproductive efficiency is one of the important goals in sheep breeding, because it plays an important role in efficiency of production. Low-fecundity in the majority of domestic sheep is one of limiting factors for the development of sheep industry. Because of low heritability of the reproduction traits and sex-limited nature, traditional selection has been employed for improving litter size with only limited advancement [1]. Scientists pay more attention to search the candidate genes associated with ovulation rate and multiplets, which can lead to genetic improvement through the implementation of gene and/or marker assisted selection (MAS) [2]. With the development of molecular, sequencing and bioinformatics analysis technologies, high throughput RNA deep sequencing (RNA-seq) provides a platform for measuring
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