Genotyping of Growth Hormone Gene in Egyptian Small Ruminant Breeds

In this study, we aimed to detect the genetic polymorphism of GH gene in major Egyptian sheep and goat breeds using PCR-RFLP and identify the single nucleotide polymorphism between different genotypes detected in these breeds. The primers used in this study flanked a 422 bp fragment from exons 2 and 3 of GH gene in sheep and goat. These PCR amplified fragments were digested with HaeIII endonuclease and the results showed the presence of two genotypes; GG and AG with the absence of AA genotype in 149 tested animals for this gene. The total frequencies were 43.56 and 56.44% for GG and AG genotypes, respectively in 101 tested sheep animals whereas in goat animals, the total frequencies were 12.5% and 87.5% for GG and AG genotypes, respectively in 48 tested goat animals. The nucleotide sequences of sheep GH alleles G and A as well as goat GH alleles G and A were submitted to nucleotide sequences database NCBI/Bankit/GenBank and have accession numbers: KP120857, KP120858, KP120859 and KP120860, respectively.