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Evidence of selection signatures that shape the Persian cat breed

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An Erratum to this article was published on 23 March 2016

Abstract

The Persian cat is mainly characterized by an extremely brachycephalic face as part of the standard body conformation. Despite the popularity, world-wide distribution, and economic importance of the Persian cat as a fancy breed, little is known about the genetics of their hallmark morphology, brachycephaly. Over 800 cats from different breeds including Persian, non-Persian breeds (Abyssinian, Cornish Rex, Bengal, La Perm, Norwegian Forest, Maine Coon, Manx, Oriental, and Siamese), and Persian-derived breeds (British Shorthair, Scottish Fold, Selkirk Rex) were genotyped with the Illumina 63 K feline DNA array. The experimental strategy was composed of three main steps: (i) the Persian dataset was screened for runs of homozygosity to find and select highly homozygous regions; (ii) selected Persian homozygous regions were evaluated for the difference of homozygosity between Persians and those considered non-Persian breeds, and, (iii) the Persian homozygous regions most divergent from the non-Persian breeds were investigated by haplotype analysis in the Persian-derived breeds. Four regions with high homozygosity (H > 0.7) were detected, each with an average length of 1 Mb. Three regions can be considered unique to the Persian breed, with a less conservative haplotype pattern in the Persian-derived breeds. Moreover, two genes, CHL1 and CNTN6 known to determine face shape modification in humans, reside in one of the identified regions and therefore are positional candidates for the brachycephalic face in Persians. In total, the homozygous regions contained several neuronal genes that could be involved in the Persian cat behavior and can provide new insights into cat domestication.

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Acknowledgments

This project was supported by funding from the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Iowa State University, the State of Iowa, Hatch funds, and the Ensminger program. This project has been funded in part previously by the National Center for Research Resources R24 RR016094 and is currently supported by the Office of Research Infrastructure Programs OD R24OD010928, the Cat Health Network (D12FE-506, D12FE-551, D12FE-552, Amyloidosis, D12FE-509, D12FE-514), University of California at Davis. The authors thank Serina Filler, University of Bristol and Jens Haggstrom, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences.

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  1. Department of Animal Science, Iowa State University, Ames, IA, USA

    Francesca Bertolini, Eui Soo Kim & Max F. Rothschild

  2. Department of Veterinary Medicine and Surgery, University of Missouri, Columbia, USA

    Barbara Gandolfi & Leslie A. Lyons

  3. Faculty of Veterinary Science, University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia

    Bianca Haase

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  1. Francesca Bertolini
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  2. Barbara Gandolfi
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  3. Eui Soo Kim
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  4. Bianca Haase
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  5. Leslie A. Lyons
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  6. Max F. Rothschild
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Correspondence to Max F. Rothschild.

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Bertolini, F., Gandolfi, B., Kim, E.S. et al. Evidence of selection signatures that shape the Persian cat breed. Mamm Genome 27, 144–155 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00335-016-9623-1

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