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1000
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Abstract/Summary
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BACKGROUND:
Leakage of water and ions and soluble pr
oteins from muscle cells occurs during
prolonged exercise due to ischemia causing muscle damage. Also
post mortem
anoxia during
conversion of muscle to meat is
marked by loss of water and soluble components from the muscle
cell. There is considerable variation in the water
holding capacity of meat
affecting economy of meat
production. Water holding capa
city depends on numerous geneti
c and environmental factors
relevant to structural and biochemical
muscle fibre properties a well as
ante
and
post
slaughter
metabolic processes.
RESULTS:
Expression microarray analysis of M.
longissimus dorsi
RNAs of 74 F2 animals of a resource
population showed 1,279 transcripts with trait co
rrelated expression to
water holding capacity.
Negatively correlated transcript
s were enriched in functional
categories an
d pathways like
extracellular matrix receptor interaction an
d calcium signalling. Transcripts with positive
correlation dominantly represented biochemical
processes including oxid
ative phosphorylation,
mitochondrial pathways, as well as transporter a
ctivity. A linkage analysis
of abundance of trait
correlated transcripts revealed
897 expression QTL (eQTL) with 104 eQTL coinciding with QTL
regions for water holding capacity; 96 transcripts had
trans
acting and 8 had
cis
acting regulation.
CONCLUSION:
The complex relationships betw
een biological processes taking place in live skeletal
muscle and meat quality are driven on the one hand
by the energy reserves and their utilisation in
the muscle and on the other hand by the muscle
structure itself and calcium signalling. Holistic
expression profiling was integrated with QTL an
alysis for the trait of interest and for gene
expression levels for crea
tion of a priority list of genes out of
the orchestra of genes of biological
networks relevant to
the liability to develo
p elevated drip loss.
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