Acta Veterinaria et Zootechnica Sinica ›› 2021, Vol. 52 ›› Issue (12): 3375-3389.doi: 10.11843/j.issn.0366-6964.2021.012.006

• ANIMAL GENETICS AND BREEDING • Previous Articles     Next Articles

The Relationship between Promoter Region DNA Methylation of TCF21 Gene and Its Expression in Chicken Adipose Tissue

LIU Yumeng1,2,3, MA Yanyan1,2,3, JIANG Haixu1,2,3, ZHANG Xinyang1,2,3, WU Chunyan1,2,3, CHENG Bohan1,2,3, LI Hui1,2,3*   

  1. 1. Key Laboratory of Chicken Genetics and Breeding, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, Harbin 150030, China;
    2. Key Laboratory of Animal Genetics, Breeding and Reproduction, Education Department of Heilongjiang Province, Harbin 150030, China;
    3. College of Animal Sciences and Technology, Northeast Agricultural University, Harbin 150030, China
  • Received:2021-09-10 Online:2021-12-25 Published:2021-12-22

Abstract: The aim of this study was to investigate the relationship between DNA methylation of TCF21 gene promoter region and its expression in chicken adipose tissue. The mRNA expression levels of TCF21 in abdominal adipose tissues of chickens which were at 7 weeks of age and from 24th generation of Northeast Agricultural University broiler lines divergently selected for abdominal fat content (NEAUHLF) were detected by RT-qPCR. The structure and function of TCF21 promoter were analyzed by bioinformatics and luciferase reporter system. The methylation level of CpG sites in the promoter region of TCF21 in the abdominal adipose tissues of the fat and lean broilers was detected by Sequenom MassARRAY platform. The TCF21 promoter reporter gene plasmid was treated with CpG methyltransferase to analyze the effect of DNA methylation on the activity of TCF21 promoter. The results showed that the mRNA expression levels of TCF21 in the abdominal adipose tissue of fat broilers were extremely significantly higher than those of lean broilers (P<0.001). There were 40 CpG sites in the promoter region, which were distributed in the proximal and distal parts of the promoter, but there was no CpG island in the promoter region of chicken TCF21 gene. The promoter of TCF21 gene was divided into 5 functional regions, namely R1 region (-2 000~-1 500 bp), R2 region (-1 500~-1 000 bp), R3 region (-1 000~-500 bp), R4 region (-500~-200 bp) and Core region (-200~-100 bp),respectively. The DNA methylation levels in the R2, R3 and R2+R3 regions of TCF21 promoter in the fat broilers were significantly or extremely significantly higher than those of the lean broilers (P<0.05 or P<0.001). The DNA methylation levels in the R2, R3 and R2+R3 regions of TCF21 promoter were significantly positively correlated with TCF21 mRNA expression levels (R2 region:r=0.438, P<0.05; R3 region:r=0.371, P<0.05; R2+R3 region:r=0.489, P<0.05). DNA methylation significantly inhibited the transcriptional activity of R2 region of TCF21 promoter (P<0.05). In summary, the expression level of TCF21 gene in abdominal adipose tissue of fat and lean broilers was mainly related to the DNA methylation level of R2 region of TCF21 promoter.

Key words: chicken, TCF21 gene, promoter, DNA methylation, gene expression, adipose tissue

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