A genetic approach to lowering protease (plasmin) levels in milk, requires the presence of polymorphism of bovine plasminogen. This study was conducted to determine to what extent genetic polymorphism exists in dairy cattle. Bovine plasminogen was first purified from Holstein cow plasma by affinity chromatography on Lysine-Sepharose and antibodies to bovine plasminogen were raised by monthly intramuscular injection of the isolated bovine plasminogen into rabbits. For plasminogen phenotyping, blood samples were collected at random from 50 Holstein and Ayrshire cattle, and plasminogen was isolated from the plasma using lysine-Sepharose and then treated with neuraminidase. After separation by isoelectric focusing (pH 3.5-9.5) in polyacrylamide gels, Plasminogen polymorphs were detected immunologically using rabbit anti-bovine plasminogen antibodies. Additionally, the plasminogen isoforms were evaluated with a functional assay (caseinolytic overlay technique) after activation of the plasminogen with urokinase. Six plasminogen phenotypes were identified which represent products of 5 variant alleles. The 5 plasminogen variants were characterized based on their isoelectric points and designated PLG A$ sb2$ (pI 6.5 and 7.0), B$ sb2$ (pI 7.6 and 7.8), C$ sb1$ (pI 6.8), D$ sb2$ (pI 7.8 and 8.0), and E$ sb2$ (pI 6.8 and 7.0). PLG A$ sb2$ and PLG B$ sb2$ were the most common variants in these cattle. The 6 phenotypes were $ rm A sb2A sb2, B sb2B sb2, A sb2B sb2, B sb2C sb1, A sb2D sb2 and D sb2E sb2$. The phenotypic frequencies in Holstein and Ayrshire were very different, $ rm A sb2A sb2 and B sb2B sb2$ being respectively the most frequent phenotype. In addition, DNA polymorphism at bovine plasminogen gene was detected when genomic DNA was digested with the restriction enzyme Msp I and hybridized with mouse plasminogen cDNA. This is the first description of plasminogen polymorphism reported in dairy cattle. If different variants have altered activity, the detrimental effect
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.26174 |
| Date | January 1994 |
| Creators | Wang, Wei |
| Contributors | Turner, J. D. (advisor) |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Master of Science (Department of Animal Science.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 001385068, proquestno: MM94540, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
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