VARIABILITY OF MYOSTATIN GENE AND ITS ASSOCIATION WITH GROWTH TRAITSIN MALPURA SHEEP

摘要

A study was carried out to assess the genetic diversity of the myostatin gene, using polymerase chain reaction (PCR) single strand conformation polymorphism (SSCP) and its association with growth traits in 458 Malpura sheep with live weight records from birth to 12 months over a period of two years (2014 to 2016) maintained at ICAR-Central Sheep and Wool Research Institute, Avikanagar. The fragments having the promoter, 5'UTR, all 3 exons, intron-1 and 3'UTR were assessed for their sequence variability. Genetic variation at nucleotide level was observed for promoter, intron-1, 5'UTR and 3'UTR region. A total six SNPs; two in promoter region (c.-958; c.-1128), two in 5'UTR (c.-37; c-40), one in intron-1 (c.373+18) and one in 3'UTR (c*202) were recorded. Genotypic association study revealed that out of four variable fragments, only promoter region had significant effect (P<0.05) on live weight at 12 months of age, average daily gain from 6 to 12 months (and corresponding Kleiber ratio (KR3). The daily weight gain for genotype CT (P4.2) was higher than genotype CC (P4.1) by 5.19 g with obvious advantage for T replacing C at a-958 and c.-1128 positions. This variation should be studied further in different breeds, populations and different locations for confirmation of the putative association for possible use of this variation in breeding programmes.