Patterns of gene expression in the central nervous system are highly variable and heritable. This genetic variation among normal individuals leads to considerable structural, functional and behavioral differences. We devised a general approach to dissect genetic networks systematically across biological scale, from base pairs to behavior, using a reference population of recombinant inbred strains. We profiled gene expression using Affymetrix oligonucleotide arrays in the BXD recombinant inbred strains, for which we have extensive SNP and haplotype data. We integrated a complementary database comprising 25 years of legacy phenotypic data on these strains. Covariance among gene expression and pharmacological and behavioral traits is often highly significant, corroborates known functional relations and is often generated by common quantitative trait loci. We found that a small number of major-effect quantitative trait loci jointly modulated large sets of transcripts and classical neural phenotypes in patterns specific to each tissue. We developed new analytic and graph theoretical approaches to study shared genetic modulation of networks of traits using gene sets involved in neural synapse function as an example. We built these tools into an open web resource called WebQTL that can be used to test a broad array of hypotheses.

The JAX Diversity Outbred population is a new mouse resource derived from partially inbred Collaborative Cross strains and maintained by randomized outcrossing. As such, it segregates the same allelic variants as the Collaborative Cross but embeds these in a distinct population architecture in which each animal has a high degree of heterozygosity and carries a unique combination of alleles. Phenotypic diversity is striking and often divergent from phenotypes seen in the founder strains of the Collaborative Cross. Allele frequencies and recombination density in early generations of Diversity Outbred mice are consistent with expectations based on simulations of the mating design. We describe analytical methods for genetic mapping using this resource and demonstrate the power and high mapping resolution achieved with this population by mapping a serum cholesterol trait to a 2-Mb region on chromosome 3 containing only 11 genes. Analysis of the estimated allele effects in conjunction with complete genome sequence data of the founder strains reduced the pool of candidate polymorphisms to seven SNPs, five of which are located in an intergenic region upstream of the Foxo1 gene.

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The Collaborative Cross (CC) is a mouse recombinant inbred strain panel that is being developed as a resource for mammalian systems genetics. Here we describe an experiment that uses partially inbred CC lines to evaluate the genetic properties and utility of this emerging resource. Genome-wide analysis of the incipient strains reveals high genetic diversity, balanced allele frequencies, and dense, evenly distributed recombination sites-all ideal qualities for a systems genetics resource. We map discrete, complex, and biomolecular traits and contrast two quantitative trait locus (QTL) mapping approaches. Analysis based on inferred haplotypes improves power, reduces false discovery, and provides information to identify and prioritize candidate genes that is unique to multifounder crosses like the CC. The number of expression QTLs discovered here exceeds all previous efforts at eQTL mapping in mice, and we map local eQTL at 1-Mb resolution. We demonstrate that the genetic diversity of the CC, which derives from random mixing of eight founder strains, results in high phenotypic diversity and enhances our ability to map causative loci underlying complex disease-related traits.

Sex specificity of neural mechanisms modulating nociceptive information has been demonstrated in rodents, and these qualitative sex differences appear to be relevant to analgesia from -opioid receptor agonists, a drug class reported to be clinically effective only in women. Via quantitative trait locus mapping followed by a candidate gene strategy using both mutant mice and pharmacological tools, we now demonstrate that the melanocortin-1 receptor (Mc1r) gene mediates -opioid analgesia in female mice only. This finding suggested that individuals with variants of the human MC1R gene, associated in our species with red hair and fair skin, might also display altered -opioid analgesia. We found that women with two variant MC1R alleles displayed significantly greater analgesia from the -opioid, pentazocine, than all other groups. This study demonstrates an unexpected role for the MC1R gene, verifies that pain modulation in the two sexes involves neurochemically distinct substrates, and represents an example of a direct translation of a pharmacogenetic finding from mouse to human.