Molecular cloning, sequence, and expression patterns of DNA damage induced transcript 3 (DDIT3) gene in female yaks (Bos grunniens)

Abstract

Endoplasmic reticulum stress (ERS) plays an important role in regulating the reproductive process of female mammals, mainly involved in follicular atresia and corpus luteum regression. DNA damage induced transcript 3 (DDIT3) is a marker gene of ERS. The objectives of the present study were to clone and analyze the sequence and tissue expression characteristics of DDIT3 gene in female yaks. By reverse transcriptase-polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR) strategy, we obtained full-length 507-bp DDIT3-cDNA, encoding for 168-aa protein. Yak DDIT3 exhibited highest and least identity with that of bison and horse, respectively. Real-time PCR analyses revealed that the expression level of DDIT3 gene in ovary was higher than that in heart, liver, kidney, spleen, lung, uterus and oviduct (p < 0.05). DDIT3 expression level in ovary and uterus during pregnancy was higher than that in follicular phase, luteal phase and fetus stage. DDIT3 was highly expressed in metaphase II oocytes and granulosa cells than that in germinal vesicle and metaphase I oocytes (p < 0.05), respectively. This is the first molecular characterization and expression patterns of DDIT3 gene in female yaks. These results indicated that the DDIT3 gene possibly plays an important role in regulating ovary function and pregnancy maintenance in yaks.

Keywords:

• Bos grunniens
• DDIT3
• gene expression
• ovary
• oocyte

Authors’ contribution

J.F. Wu: Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Methodology, Validation, Writing - original draft. Y. Liu: Formal analysis, Methodology. X.D. Zi: Conceptualization, Supervision, Writing - review & editing. H. Li: Investigation, Resources. J.Y. Lu: Investigation, Resources. T. Jing: Investigation.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Data availability statement

The yak DDIT3 cDNA sequence reported in this paper has been deposited in the GenBank database as accession numbers: MW506292.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the National Major Science and Technology Projects of China, China (No. 2018YFD0502303), and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities, Southwest Minzu University (2021PTJS26).