Single nucleotide polymorphisms on peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor genes associated with fatness traits in chicken

The peroxisome proliferator-activated receptors (PPARs) are members of a superfamily of nuclear hormone receptors. Lots of studies in rodents and humans have shown that PPARs were involved in lipid metabolism and adipocyte differentiation. The main objective of this work was to detect the single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in whole coding regions of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor alpha (PPAR-alpha) and gamma (PPAR-gamma) genes with approach of single strand conformation polymorphism (SSCP) in the chicken population of Arber Acres broiler, Hyline layer and three Chinese native breeds (Shiqiza, Beijing You, Bai'er). Two SNPs of C1029T and C297T were found in chicken PPAR-alpha and PPAR-gamma genes respectively and each SNP found three genotypes in the experimental populations. The results showed that the distribution frequency of 3 genotypes in Arber Acres broiler, Hyline layer and Chinese native breeds had significant differences on the PPAR-alpha and PPAR-gamma gene respectively (p<0.01). Furthermore, in the PPAR-alpha gene, the results of least square estimation for genotypes and body composition traits showed the BB genotype birds had higher abdominal fat weight (AFW) and percentage of abdominal fat (AFP) than AA genotype birds (p<0.05). From these we conjecture the PPAR-alpha and PPAR-gamma genes were suffered intensive selection during the long term commercial breeding and the PPAR-alpha gene may be a major gene or linked to the major genes that impact chicken fat metabolism and the SNPs could be used in molecular assistant selection (MAS) as a genetic marker for the chicken fatness traits.