Characterization of MC1R in silky fowl, a special black-bone rooster in China

Abstract

The melanocortin 1 receptor (MC1R) plays an important role in determining plumage color, and the variants of MC1R have been found to be associated with the color of plumage and skin in both domestic and wild birds. However, the molecular and genetic mechanism for plumage color variation has not been reported in silky fowl, which is a unique subspecies in China with high nutritive value. We sequenced and analyzed the encoding region of MC1R from silky fowl. The predicted coding region of MC1R is 945 bp, which is the same size as the one inGallus gallus. Six nucleotide polymorphisms that lead to four protein mutations were detected, which were M71T, E92K, S124G and H215P, respectively. Among the four mutations, the S124G mutation is found to be unique to silky fowl. A phylogenetic tree analysis of MC1R from silky fowl and other species of chicken shows a close relationship between silky fowl andGallus gallus. Furthermore, the eukaryotic expression vector pEGFP-N1-MC1R was constructed, and transfected into goat fibroblasts by means of electroporation. The success of MC1R gene expression in transfected goat fibroblasts makes it possible to develop transgenic animals for further studies.