Abstract
The rapid development of genome modification technology has provided many great benefits in diverse areas of research and industry. Genome modification technologies have also been actively used in a variety of research areas and fields of industry in avian species. Transgenic technologies such as lentiviral systems and piggyBac transposition have been used to produce transgenic birds for diverse purposes. In recent years, newly developed programmable genome editing tools such as transcription activator-like effector nuclease (TALEN) and clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR)/CRISPR-associated protein 9 (CRISPR/Cas9) have also been successfully adopted in avian systems with primordial germ cell (PGC)-mediated genome modification. These genome modification technologies are expected to be applied to practical uses beyond system development itself. The technologies could be used to enhance economic traits in poultry such as acquiring a disease resistance or producing functional proteins in eggs. Furthermore, novel avian models of human diseases or embryonic development could also be established for research purposes. In this review, we discuss diverse genome modification technologies used in avian species, and future applications of avian biotechnology.
Highlights
Genome modification in living organisms provides several advantages for research and industrial purposes
Our previous studies reported that piggyBac transposition was effective in producing transgenic chickens mediated by transplantation of genome-modified primordial germ cell (PGC) [38,39], and the system was used to develop a chicken model combined with site-specific recombination technology [36]
The study showed that the DDX4 gene was successfully replaced by transcription activator-like effector nuclease (TALEN)-mediated homologous recombination in PGCs (8.1%), and genome-edited chickens were produced by transplanting PGCs (~6%)
Summary
Genome modification in living organisms provides several advantages for research and industrial purposes. Despite the high efficiency of genome modification in living organisms, viral infection systems have fundamental limitations, such as their use in food proteins for human consumption and random exogenous gene integration in host cells causing unexpected results with low germline transmission efficiency and silencing effects in transgenic animals [22,25,26]. To overcome these obstacles, a transgenic technology using transposons was developed. The reports showed that Tol transposons integrated into the genomes of chicken cell lines, including the PGCs, in an efficient manner (45.2%) [37], and even direct in vivo injection of Tol transposons and transposase plasmids into the bloodstream of chicken embryos was successfully used to produce transgenic chickens, despite low germline transmission efficiency (
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