Understanding seasonal weight loss tolerance in dairy goats: a transcriptomics approach

Abstract

Background Seasonal weight loss (SWL) is a very important limitation to the production of ruminants in the Mediterranean and Tropical regions. In these areas, long dry seasons lead to poor pastures with low nutritional value. During the dry season, ruminants, particularly those raised in extensive production systems, lose around 30% of their body weight. Seasonal weight loss has important consequences on animal productive performance and health. In this study, RNA sequencing was used to characterize feed restriction effects in dairy goat of 2 breeds with different SWL tolerance: Majorera (tolerant) and Palmera (susceptible). Nine Majorera and ten Palmera goats were randomly distributed in a control and a restricted group: Majorera Control (adequately fed; MC; n = 4), Palmera Control (adequately fed; PC; n = 6), Majorera Restricted (feed restricted; ME; n = 5) and Palmera Restricted (feed restricted; PE; n = 4). On day 22 of the trial, mammary gland biopsies were collected for transcriptomics analysis. Results From these samples, 24,260 unique transcripts were identified. From those, 82 transcripts were differentially expressed between MC and ME, 99 between PC and PE, twelve between both control groups and twenty-nine between both restricted groups. Conclusions Feed restriction affected several biochemical pathways in both breeds such as: carbohydrate and lipid transport; intracellular trafficking, RNA processing and signal transduction. This research also highlights the importance or involvement of the genes in tolerance (ENPP1, S-LZ, MT2A and GPNB) and susceptibility (GPD1, CTPS1, ELOVL6 and NR4A1) to SWL with respectively higher expression in the Majorera restriced group and the Palmera restricted group in comparison to the control groups. In addition, results from the study may be extrapolated to other dairy ruminant species.

Nutritional Regulation of Mammary Gland Development and Milk Synthesis in Animal Models and Dairy Species

“…These gene expression modifications are related to reduced milk production and milk protein and fat yields. Consistently and more recently, Parreira et al [ 159 ] observed that feed restriction (at a 15–20% reduction in their initial live body weight) for 22 days altered the mammary transcriptomes in 2 breeds of dairy goats with different seasonal weight loss tolerances: Majorera (tolerant) and Palmera (susceptible). In Majorera and Palmera goats, 82 and 99 transcripts were differentially expressed between control and restricted diets, respectively [ 159 ].…”

“…Consistently and more recently, Parreira et al [ 159 ] observed that feed restriction (at a 15–20% reduction in their initial live body weight) for 22 days altered the mammary transcriptomes in 2 breeds of dairy goats with different seasonal weight loss tolerances: Majorera (tolerant) and Palmera (susceptible). In Majorera and Palmera goats, 82 and 99 transcripts were differentially expressed between control and restricted diets, respectively [ 159 ]. Feed restriction in both breeds affected several biochemical pathways such as carbohydrate and lipid transport intracellular trafficking, RNA processing, and signal transduction, with higher effects in the Majorera breed.…”

“…Indeed, in these areas, long dry seasons lead to poor pastures with low nutritional value. During the dry season, ruminants, particularly those raised in extensive production systems, lose approximately 30% of their body weight [ 158 , 159 ]. In addition, it is now well accepted that one of the main effects of climate change will lead to food availability.…”

Extensive Sheep and Goat Production: The Role of Novel Technologies towards Sustainability and Animal Welfare

“…Contrarily, the restricted Palmera goats upregulated genes involved in suppressing cell differentiation and related to the response to DNA damage, demonstrating the effects of mammary gland involution. Comparing both restricted groups identified two genes associated with unregulated tissue development in Palmera goats (CPM and ASB11) [ 98 ]. This is confirmed through two different proteomic approaches that identified a high abundance of apoptotic proteins in the restricted Palmeras and suggested cadherin-13, collagen alpha-1, and clusterin as another set of putative biomarkers to SWL tolerance in the Majorera goat breed [ 99 , 100 ].…”

Domestic animal proteomics in the 21st century: A global retrospective and viewpoint analysis

“…Animals need to adapt to increased temperatures that negatively affect production. The adaptation mechanisms of small ruminant goat breeds against weight loss during dry seasons has been extensively described using proteomics, transcriptomics and metabolomics [10,91,92]. Similarly, pig breeds answer differently to high temperature-humidity indexes, which has been supported by differential gene expression results [93].…”