Analysis of m6A methylation in skin tissues of different sex Liaoning cashmere goats

Identification and functional analysis of m6A in the mammary gland tissues of dairy goats at the early and peak lactation stages

N6-methyladenosine (m⁶A) is the most common reversible epigenetic RNA modification in the mRNA of all higher eukaryotic organisms and plays an important role in the regulation of gene expression and cell function. In this study, m⁶A-modified methylated RNA immunoprecipitation sequencing (MeRIP-seq) and transcriptome sequencing (RNA-seq) were used to identify the key genes with m⁶A modification during mammary gland development and lactation in dairy goats. The results showed that m⁶A methylation occurred at 3,927 loci, which were significantly enriched in the 3′ untranslated region (3′UTR) and the termination codon region. In the early stage and peak stage of lactation, m⁶A methylation occurred extensively in mammary tissues, and a total of 725 differentially expressed m⁶A-modified genes were obtained, all negatively correlated with mRNA expression. In addition, Gene Ontology (GO) enrichment and Kyoto Encyclopedia of Genes and Genomes (KEGG) pathway analysis showed that different methylated genes were mainly involved in the growth and apoptosis of mammary epithelial cells through signaling pathways, such as the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) and phospholipase D pathways, and then affected the development and lactation of mammary gland. All in all, we identified and analyzed the methylation events related to the development and lactation regulation of mammary gland at the early and peak lactation stages, and provided a theoretical basis to reveal the physiological regulatory system of mammary gland development and lactation in dairy goats.

Selection of Cashmere Fineness Functional Genes by Translatomics

Cashmere fineness is an important index to evaluate cashmere quality. Liaoning Cashmere Goat (LCG) has a large cashmere production and long cashmere fiber, but its fineness is not ideal. Therefore, it is important to find genes involved in cashmere fineness that can be used in future endeavors aiming to improve this phenotype. With the continuous advancement of research, the regulation of cashmere fineness has made new developments through high-throughput sequencing and genome-wide association analysis. It has been found that translatomics can identify genes associated with phenotypic traits. Through translatomic analysis, the skin tissue of LCG sample groups differing in cashmere fineness was sequenced by Ribo-seq. With these data, we identified 529 differentially expressed genes between the sample groups among the 27197 expressed genes. From these, 343 genes were upregulated in the fine LCG group in relation to the coarse LCG group, and 186 were downregulated in the same relationship. Through GO enrichment analysis and KEGG enrichment analysis of differential genes, the biological functions and pathways of differential genes can be found. In the GO enrichment analysis, 491 genes were significantly enriched, and the functional region was mainly in the extracellular region. In the KEGG enrichment analysis, the enrichment of the human papillomavirus infection pathway was seen the most. We found that the COL6A5 gene may affect cashmere fineness.