Studies for Identification of Polymorphism in Promoter Sequence of growth hormone gene from microminipig (MMP) with direct sequencing PCR

Growth hormone (GH) is the main protein hormone released from anterior pituitary gland of hypothalamus region of brain in mammals. It is extensively studied in pig and it is encoded by GH gene. Microminipig (MMP) is the world’s smallest pig developed by Fuji Micra Inc, Japan. It weighs 6-7 kg at the age of 6 months. The transcription regulation is the key step in expression of eukaryotic gene expression and it depends on various cis and transacting elements. To our knowledge, the variation in sequence of GH promoter region in MMP, 1 kb upstream from 1st exon has studied first time. All consensus sites are conserved in MMPs except TATA box sequence which has another version such as TATATAAA. The Variations at -934, 713, -626, -574 and -499 sites are observed only in MMPs. These variations of MMPs could be used as possible genetic markers for pig production.