Xiaolin Liu
College of Animal Sciences, Northwest A&F University

The beef cattle is one of the most economically important animals in the world, providing free of charge for meat and skin. However, lack of genetic information on this organism is an obstacle to understanding the mechanisms behind its development. Analysis of the beef cattle transcriptome and its expression profile data is essential to extending the genetic information resources on this species, providing a shortcut that will support studies on beef cattle.
Transcriptome sequencing of beef cattle was performed using Illumina High-Seq2000 platform. A total of 25605140 and 26214800 reads were sequenced for in embryo and in adult pools, respectively. We identified 24464-29994 novel transcript units in two tested samples. In addition, 8533-10144 genes showed evidence of alternative splicing, and alternative 3’ splicing is the most common type of alternative splicing events in cattle. We detected expression for a total of 16174 genes, with 6800 genes showing differential expression between the two pools with false discovery rate (FDR) ≤ 0.001. Using GO enrichment and KEGG pathway analysis, multiple Go term and biological pathways were found to be significantly enriched for differentially expressed genes (FDR ≤ 0.01). A total of 30618-31334 putative single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) were identified in coding region.
We obtained a high-quality beef cattle reference transcriptome using a high throughput sequencing approach, providing the valuable resource for better understanding of beef cattle genome. The transcriptome data will facilitate future functional studies on beef cattle genome, and gradually apply in breeding programs of beef cattle, as well as closely related other mammals.