Discovery of genes and proteins possibly regulating mean wool fibre diameter using cDNA microarray and proteomic approaches

Jinshan Zhao,Rongwei Han,F M Perez-Campo,Hegang Li,Jingjing Xin,Huaiyuan Qin,Nan Liu

doi:10.1038/s41598-020-64903-7

Abstract

Wool fibre diameter (WFD) is one of the wool traits with higher economic impact. However, the main genes specifically regulating WFD remain unidentified. In this current work we have used Agilent Sheep Gene Expression Microarray and proteomic technology to investigate the gene expression patterns of body side skin, bearing more wool, in Aohan fine wool sheep, a Chinese indigenous breed, and compared them with that of small tail Han sheep, a sheep bread with coarse wool. Microarray analyses showed that most of the genes likely determining wool diameter could be classified into a few categories, including immune response, regulation of receptor binding and growth factor activity. Certain gene families might play a role in hair growth regulation. These include growth factors, immune cytokines, solute carrier families, cellular respiration and glucose transport amongst others. Proteomic analyses also identified scores of differentially expressed proteins.

Highlights

Wool fibre diameter (WFD) is one of the wool traits with higher economic impact
RNA-sequencing (RNA-seq) has been used to identify genes differentially expressed in cashmere goat skin during hair follicle initiation and cycling[24]
All data obtained from the cDNA microarray have been submitted to NCBI’s Gene

Summary

Introduction

Wool fibre diameter (WFD) is one of the wool traits with higher economic impact. the main genes regulating WFD remain unidentified. Microarray and other transcriptome analysis techniques have been successfully employed to analyze the properties of hair follicle stem cells in both mouse[9,10] and human[11,12] Different traits, such as resistance to parasites, mammary glands development and milk quality[13,14,15], wool follicle development[16], fleece resistance to rot[17] or wool and skin pigmentation[18] have been studied on sheep and goat using microarrays[19,20]. RNA-sequencing (RNA-seq) has been used to identify genes differentially expressed in cashmere goat skin during hair follicle initiation and cycling[24]. Several studies have confirmed the effectiveness of cDNA microarray for establishing the expression profiling of different wool follicle growth stages in whole skin[28,29,30,31,32]

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