TY - JOUR
T1 - Identification of the porcine homologous of human disease causing trinucleotide repeat sequences
AU - Madsen, Lone Bruhn
AU - Thomsen, Bo
AU - Sølvsten, Christina Ane Elisabeth
AU - Bendixen, Christian
AU - Fredholm, Merete
AU - Jørgensen, Arne Lund
AU - Nielsen, Anders Lade
PY - 2007
Y1 - 2007
N2 - expansion in the repeat number of intragenic trinucleotide repeats (TNRs) is associated with a variety of inherited human neurodegenerative diseases. To study the compositionof TNRs in a mammalian species representing an evolutionary intermediate between humans and arodents, we describe in this paper the identification of porcine noncoding and polyglutamine-encoding TNR regions and the comparison to the homologous TNRs from human, chimpanzee, dog, opossum, rat, and mouse. Several of the porcine TNR regions are highly polymorphic both within and between different breeds. The TNR regions are more conserved in terms of repeat length between humans and pigs than between humans and rodents suggesting that TNR lengths could be implicated in mammalian evolution. The TNRs in the FMR2, SCA6, SCA12, and Huntingtin geenes are comparable in length to alleles naturally occurring in humans, and also in FMR1, a long uninterrupted CGG TNR was identified. Most strikingly, we identified a Huntingtin allele with 21 unimterrupted CAG repeats encoding a stretch of 24 polyglutamines. Examination of this particular Huntingtin TNR in 349 porcine offspring showed stable transmission. The presence in the porcine genome of TNRs within genes that, in humans, can undergo pathogenic expansions support the usage of the pig as an alternative animal model for studies of TNR evolution, stability, and functional properties.
AB - expansion in the repeat number of intragenic trinucleotide repeats (TNRs) is associated with a variety of inherited human neurodegenerative diseases. To study the compositionof TNRs in a mammalian species representing an evolutionary intermediate between humans and arodents, we describe in this paper the identification of porcine noncoding and polyglutamine-encoding TNR regions and the comparison to the homologous TNRs from human, chimpanzee, dog, opossum, rat, and mouse. Several of the porcine TNR regions are highly polymorphic both within and between different breeds. The TNR regions are more conserved in terms of repeat length between humans and pigs than between humans and rodents suggesting that TNR lengths could be implicated in mammalian evolution. The TNRs in the FMR2, SCA6, SCA12, and Huntingtin geenes are comparable in length to alleles naturally occurring in humans, and also in FMR1, a long uninterrupted CGG TNR was identified. Most strikingly, we identified a Huntingtin allele with 21 unimterrupted CAG repeats encoding a stretch of 24 polyglutamines. Examination of this particular Huntingtin TNR in 349 porcine offspring showed stable transmission. The presence in the porcine genome of TNRs within genes that, in humans, can undergo pathogenic expansions support the usage of the pig as an alternative animal model for studies of TNR evolution, stability, and functional properties.
KW - Former LIFE faculty
KW - Neurodegeneration
KW - Repeat expansion
KW - Ataxia
KW - Animal models
KW - Genomics
U2 - 10.1007/s10048-007-0088-y
DO - 10.1007/s10048-007-0088-y
M3 - Journal article
C2 - 17516099
SN - 1364-6745
VL - 8
SP - 207
EP - 218
JO - Neurogenetics
JF - Neurogenetics
IS - 3
ER -
