ABSTRACT
The expression changes of genes associated with adipose metabolism and regulation of cell growth in backfat tissue at five growth stages (1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 months) of Landrace (a leaner Western breed) and Taihu pigs (a fatty indigenous Chinese breed) were measured by using pathway-focused Oligo microarray. The comparative results between two pig breeds of change ratios showed that the fold changes of 10, 6, 11, 8 and 19 genes were over two times at same month from 1 to 5 months respectively. Variance analysis (ANOVA) revealed that 25 genes in Landrace pigs showed significantly altered in expression among five growth stages (P < 0.05). Principal components analysis (PCA) revealed that angiopoietin-like 4 (ANGPTL4), cathepsin K (CTSK), isocitrate dehydrogenase 2(NADP+) (IDH2), lipoprotein lipase (LPL), malic enzyme 1 (ME1), stearoyl-CoA desaturase (SCD) and uncoupling protein 2 (UCP2) displayed distinctive expression patterns from other genes, which suggested that these genes may be subject to special regulation during the period from 1 to 5 months. K-means clustering analysis revealed that genes in Landrace pigs which showed up-regulation were mainly related to the positive regulation of fatty acid metabolism and genes in Taihu pigs which showed slight fluctuation were mainly related to the regulation of cell growth. Quantitative real-time RT-PCR was used to verify the microarray data for five modulated genes, and a good positive correlation between the two measures of expression was observed for both two pig breeds at different growth stages. These results highlight some possible candidate genes for porcine carcass and meat quality traits, reveal the expressional disciplinarian of correlative genes and provide some data on which to base further study of the dynamic balance process for fatty acid biogynthesis and hydrolyzation.
