Screening of Candidate Genes and Tissue Expression Analysis of Lambing Traits for the Guizhou Black Goat

We used RNAseq analysis to identify key genes affecting reproductive traits for the Guizhou black goat. We utilized mRNA collected from uterine, ovarian and fallopian tube tissues of goats with the same pedigree and analyzed the results using bioinformatics and qRT-PCR. We found 8120 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in ovarian tissues (3205 up-and 4915 down-regulated), 5255 DEGs in the fallopian tubes (1317 up-and 3888 down-regulated) and 5180 DEGs in uterine tissue (2597 up-and 2583 down-regulated). The biological processes associated with these DEGs were primarily cell differentiation, reproduction and biological regulation. The associated gene functions were related to organelle, cell membrane and cell structure in cell component processes and for molecular function, the genes were related to protein binding, catalytic activity and cell proliferation. Moreover, these DEGs were enriched in the categories of signal transduction, reproductive system, endocrine system and cancer-related pathways and linked the cGMP-PKG, cAMP, TGF beta and mTOR signaling pathways to reproductive performance. We verified these results using qRT-PCR for 9 up-regulated (AMH, CYP19A1, FOXL2, FSHR, GATA4, INHBA, LHB, LHX9 and ZP3) and 9 down-regulated (CNOT1. DMRTA1, GHRHR, Hox-All, Oviductin, PCYT1B, SLC34A2, WDR19 andWnt-7A) genes. The results were consistent with the RNAseq results and we more specifically linked AMH, GATA4, Oviductin and DMRTA1 to lambing traits of the Guizhou black goat.