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Consequences of gene editing of PRLR on thermotolerance, growth, and male reproduction in cattle.

Camila J CuellarThiago F AmaralPaula Rodriguez-VillamilFelipe Ledur OngarattoD Onan MartinezRémi LabrecqueJoão Diego de Agostini LosanoEliab Estrada-CortésJonathan R BostromKyra MartinsD Owen RaeJeremy BlockQuinn A HoornBradford W DaigneaultJonathan MerriamMichael LohuisSerdal DikmenJoão H J BittarTatiane S MaiaDaniel F CarlsonSabreena LarsonTad S SonstegardPeter James Hansen
Published in: FASEB bioAdvances (2024)
Global warming is a major challenge to the sustainable and humane production of food because of the increased risk of livestock to heat stress. Here, the example of the prolactin receptor ( PRLR ) gene is used to demonstrate how gene editing can increase the resistance of cattle to heat stress by the introduction of mutations conferring thermotolerance. Several cattle populations in South and Central America possess natural mutations in PRLR that result in affected animals having short hair and being thermotolerant. CRISPR/Cas9 technology was used to introduce variants of PRLR in two thermosensitive breeds of cattle - Angus and Jersey. Gene-edited animals exhibited superior ability to regulate vaginal temperature (heifers) and rectal temperature (bulls) compared to animals that were not gene-edited. Moreover, gene-edited animals exhibited superior growth characteristics and had larger scrotal circumference. There was no evidence for deleterious effects of the mutation on carcass characteristics or male reproductive function. These results indicate the potential for reducing heat stress in relevant environments to enhance cattle productivity.
Keyphrases
  • heat stress
  • crispr cas
  • heat shock
  • copy number
  • genome editing
  • genome wide
  • genome wide identification
  • body mass index
  • dna methylation
  • rectal cancer
  • oxidative stress
  • physical activity
  • genetic diversity
  • body weight