Variation found in potential genes influencing growth and carcass composition in Ovis aries: UCP1 and PRKAG3

Abstract

Economically important production traits in the New Zealand sheep meat industry underpin one of the country’s most significant agricultural exports. Polymerase Chain Reaction-Single Strand Conformational Polymorphism (PCR-SSCP) was utilised to detect the variation within two genes in sheep which are hypothesised to have involvement in body growth and compositional traits in sheep (Ovis aries). Variation in the the gene encoding uncoupling protein 1 in both the promoter region and intron 5 region was found to be significantly influenced by congenital effects due to sire and relatedness of the 1125 individuals typed. This casts uncertainty upon previous results indicating that the gene is involved in the partitioning of energy consumed to the production of lean meat as opposed to adipose tissue. The PRKAG3 gene that has shown promising results in terms of skeletal glycogen content and lipogenesis in other species was found to vary significantly (P<0.001) between sheep breeds. No phenotypical information was analysed during this study and as such, further research is required to quantify any potential effects of both genes. As the New Zealand sheep meat industry faces many challenges in variability, any advantages that may be garnered from either UCP1 or PRKAG3 could have significant profitability advantages if they prove a valuable asset to breeding programmes.