Abstract

In wild animal conservation, knowing the age of an individual animal is extremely beneficial. However, estimating the age is difficult for many species. Recently, epigenetics-based methods of estimating age have been reported. These studies were predominantly on humans with few reports on other animals, especially wild animals. In the present study, a chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) age prediction model was developed based on the ELOVL2, CCDC102B, and ZNF423 genes that may also have application in human age prediction. Pyrosequencing was used to measure methylation in 20 chimpanzee blood samples and correlation between age and methylation status was calculated. Age and methylation of sites in ELOVL2 and CCDC102B were significantly correlated and an age prediction model was created using these genes. In the regression equation using only ELOVL2, the highest correlation coefficient was 0.741, with a mean absolute deviation (MAD) of 5.41, compared with the combination of ELOVL2 and CCDC102B, where the highest correlation coefficient was 0.742 and the MAD was 5.41. Although larger MADs were observed in chimpanzees than in humans based on these genes, the results indicate the feasibility of estimating chimpanzee age using DNA methylation, and can have implications in understanding the ecology of chimpanzees and chimpanzee conservation.

Highlights

  • In wild animal conservation, knowing the age of an individual animal is extremely beneficial

  • DNA methylation is a form of epigenetic modification and cytosine-5 methylation of CpG dinucleotides is the best-studied epigenetic modification[15]

  • In order to develop an age prediction model for chimpanzees, DNA methylation was analysed for 20 DNA samples obtained from chimpanzees aged 2 to 39 years

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Summary

Introduction

In wild animal conservation, knowing the age of an individual animal is extremely beneficial. Epigenetics-based methods of estimating age have been reported. These studies were predominantly on humans with few reports on other animals, especially wild animals. A chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes) age prediction model was developed based on the ELOVL2, CCDC102B, and ZNF423 genes that may have application in human age prediction. We analysed DNA methylation of three genes in the epigenetic clock region of humans[19], ELOVL2 (elongation of very long chain fatty acids protein 2), CDCC102B (coiled-coil domain-containing protein 102B), and ZNF423 (zinc-finger protein 423), to develop an accurate age prediction model for chimpanzees

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