Kinky Coat, a New Autosomal Recessive Mutation in the Musk Shrew, <I>Suncus murinus</I>

Development and Characterization of CATS Markers for Genetic Linkage Mapping in the House Musk Shrew, Suncus murinus

“…Except for CYP1A2 which deviated significantly from the expected 3:1 ratio at P<0.01 (chi square value of 9.56) for unknown reasons, all the remaining 17 markers were not different at P>0.05: X-linked dominant markers CHGA, FGFR4 and GHR (chi-square values of 0-3.3); autosomal co-dominant markers ADA, GUSB, LMC1, PKM2 and TXN (chi-square values of 0.25-0.66); and autosomal dominant markers ADRBK2, BCL2, CREM, CYP1A2, CYP21, GJB2, MAOA, MET, MYOD1 and NRAS (chi-square values of 0.04-0.97). In addition, segregation patterns of three mutant genes, kc, oeb and wz, were not significantly different from the expected 3:1 ratios based on autosomal recessive inheritance as previously reported [8,9,21]. Genotyping data for this study will be made available upon request.…”

“…Animals: Animals used included four male parents from the BAN-kc, oeb strain, fixed for two mutations of kinky-coat (kc) [8] and open-eyelids at birth (oeb) [9], ten female parents from the WZ strain, fixed for the waltzing (wz) mutation [21], and 31 F 1 and 77 F 2 animals of their progeny. The husbandry of all the shrews has been described previously [10].…”

“…Several spontaneous mutations in coat hair, behavior, morphology, diabetes, etc. have been reported [8,9,21,22] in established laboratory strains. Effects of various emetic and anti-emetic drugs have been extensively studied in the house musk shrew which has shown a potential as a model for emetic research [26], because it is one of the few mammalian species that vomits in response to emetic drugs.…”

Oculocutaneous Albinism in Suncus murinus: Establishment of a Strain and Identification of Its Responsible Gene

“…Several habitat-related morphological and genetic variations have been confirmed in this species, including variations in coat colors [14,16,19]. Since 1973, several laboratory strains have been established from wild house musk shrew populations [29], including mutant strains harboring coat abnormalities, such as a cream coat color (cr) [15], curly hair (ch) [28], and kinky coat (kc) [17], as well as a mutant strain with abnormal eye coloration (red-eyed dilution (rd) [32]). However, no albino-like strain had been established, even though the capture of albino-like shrews has been reported since 1968 [31,44].…”

Characterization of Mycoplasma Strains Isolated from House Musk Shrews (<I>Suncus murinus</I>) and Their Infectivity in Mice and Rats

“…Moreover, they frequently produce chronic respiratory disease, arthritis and genital tract infections in these animal species. The house musk shrew (Suncus murinus) is a species of insectivore, and has recently attracted attention as a new experimental animal [9,10,12,18] , but little information is available on the infectious agents in this animal species. Isolation of mycoplasma from house musk shrew was first reported by Ito et al in 1988 [11].…”