The Characteristic of Tuvan Short-Fat Tailed Sheep(Ovis aries) Populations by GDF9 Gene Polymorphism

Tuvan short-fat tailed sheep is a local breed spread in the Russian Federation. This breed inhabits the Tuva Republic and consists of steppe and mountain breed types. The aim of investigation is the identification of the genetic polymorphism of the growth differentiation factor-9 (GDF9) gene in Tuvan local sheep populations. It is a potential genetic marker of prolificacy and the feature of sheep populations by this gene polymorphism can be useful for sheep breeding and breed conservation. Genomic DNA was isolated from samples of blood of 144 sheep of steppe type and 106 sheep of mountain type. Two primers were used to obtain a 462 bps DNA fragment. The polymorphism of GDF9 gene (CC, CD and DD genotypes) were detected after amplicons were digested with AspLEI restriction enzyme. In mountain type population CC and CD genotypes of GDF9 gene were identified with 0.886 and 0.114 frequencies and DD genotype was not observed. C and D allele frequencies were 0.94 and 0.06, respectively. The steppe type sheep population included CC, CD and DD genotypes with 0.833, 0.160 and 0.007 frequencies. C and D allele frequencies were 0.91 and 0.09, respectively.