Plant & Animal Genomes XVII Conference

January 10-14, 2009
Town & Country Convention Center
San Diego, CA

Quantitative Gene Expression Analysis For Meat Quality Related Genes On Pig Chromosome 6

Xiaoping Li¹ , Cheol-Koo Lee² , Zhiliang Hu³ , Kwan-suk Kim¹

¹  College of Agriculture, Life and Environment Sciences, Chungbuk National University, Korea

²  College of Life and Environmental Sciences, Korea University, Korea

³  Department of Animal Science, Center for Integrated Animal Genomics, Iowa State University, Ames, IA, USA

Pig chromosome 6 (SSC6) has been previously reported to contain QTL affecting backfat thickness (BF), intramuscular fat content (IMF) and muscle area (MA) which indicated SSC6 may conclude multiple candidate genes for pig growth and meat quality. So far, the responsible genes are still unclear. In this study, we constructed a quantitative gene expression map of SSC6 and assigned 1412 pig affy elements on it via the newest human-pig comparative maps. Using adipose tissues from four Yorkshire and four KNP (Korean Native pig), we isolated total RNA and studied the gene expression using the Affymetrix porcine genome array. Results: we found 43 elements showed differential expression (p<0.05) in adipose tissues between the two breeds. Therein, 35 elements were differentially expressed between SW1038 and SW1881, which expand about 70 cM and include the previously reported QTLs. However, the expression of candidate gene LEPR did not show significant difference in this study. In order to further investigate the relationship between gene expression and phenotypic variation, twenty F2 animals from KNP and Yorkshire reciprocal crosses family which showed a big variation in backfat thickness and some meat quality traits will be used for quantitative gene expression analysis using real-time PCR. Two candidate genes for the SSC6 QTL (FABP3 and LEPR) as well as some other meat quality related genes will be included. Our study will provide new insights on the meat quality QTL of the pig chromosome 6.