| Summary: | <p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>At present, few imprinted genes have been reported in cattle compared to human and mouse. Comparative expression analysis and imprinting status are powerful tools for investigating the biological significance of genomic imprinting and studying the regulation mechanisms of imprinted genes. The objective of this study was to assess the imprinting status and pattern of expression of the <it>SLC38A4</it>, <it>NNAT</it>, <it>NAP1L5</it>, and <it>H19 </it>genes in bovine tissues.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>A polymorphism-based approach was used to assess the imprinting status of four bovine genes in a total of 75 tissue types obtained from 12 fetuses and their dams. In contrast to mouse <it>Slc38a4</it>, which is imprinted in a tissue-specific manner, we found that <it>SLC38A4 </it>is not imprinted in cattle, and we found it expressed in all adult tissues examined. Two single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) were identified in <it>NNAT </it>and used to distinguish between monoallelic and biallelic expression in fetal and adult tissues. The two transcripts of <it>NNAT </it>showed paternal expression like their orthologues in human and mouse. However, in contrast to human and mouse, <it>NNAT </it>was expressed in a wide range of tissues, both fetal and adult. Expression analysis of <it>NAP1L5 </it>in five heterozygous fetuses showed that the gene was paternally expressed in all examined tissues, in contrast to mouse where imprinting is tissue-specific. <it>H19 </it>was found to be maternally expressed like its orthologues in human, sheep, and mouse.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>This is the first report on the imprinting status of <it>SLC38A4</it>, <it>NAP1L5</it>, and on the expression patterns of the two transcripts of <it>NNAT </it>in cattle. It is of interest that the imprinting of <it>NAP1L5</it>, <it>NNAT</it>, and <it>H19 </it>appears to be conserved between mouse and cow, although the tissue distribution of expression differs. In contrast, the imprinting of <it>SLC38A4 </it>appears to be species-specific.</p>
|
|---|
