ABSTRACT.Chicken is an important model organism that unites the evolutionary gap between mammals and other vertebrates and provide major source of protein from meat and eggs for all over the world population. However, specific genes underlying the regulatory mechanism of broiler pigmentation have not yet been determined. In order to better understand the genes involved in the mechanism of pigmentation in the muscle tissues of broilers, the Affymetrix microarray hybridization experiment platform was used to identify gene expression profiles at 7 weeks of age. Broilers fed canthaxanthin, natural lutein, and orangeII pigments (100 mg/kg) were used to explore gene expression profiles). Our data showed that the 7th week of age was a very important phase with regard to gene expression profiles. We identified a number of differentially expressed genes; in canthaxanthin, natural lutein, and orangeII, there were 54 (32 upregulated and 22 downregulated), 23 (15 upregulated and 8 downregulated), and 7 (5 upregulated and 2 downregulated) known genes, respectively. Our data indicate that the numbers of differentially expressed genes were more upregulated than downregulated, and several genes showed conserved signaling to previously known functions. Thus, functional characterization of differentially expressed genes revealed several categories that are involved in important biological processes, including pigmentation, growth, molecular mechanisms, fat metabolism, cell proliferation, immune response, lipid metabolism, and protein synthesis and degradation. The results of the present study demonstrate that the genes associated with canthaxanthin, natural lutein, and orangeII are key regulatory genes that control the regulatory mechanisms of pigmentation.

Milk is a nutritious food but at the same time is an excellent medium for the growth of microorganisms. Nearly all the changes in taste, flavour or appearance of raw milk are result of bacterial activities. The activities of these bacteria if pathogenic may cause certain health problems. In this study sixty milk samples collected each from three different consumers and producing areas of Abbottabad city, were analyzed for physico-chemical properties and microbial analysis. The mean scores of colour, taste and flavour for marketed raw milk and fresh milk were 7.03, 5.86, 5.71 and 7.06, 7.15, 6.75, respectively. 30% of the samples of marketed raw milk gave positive response to alcohol precipitation test and all samples of fresh milk gave negative response to alcohol precipitation test. The mean value of specific gravity for marketed raw milk and fresh milk was 1.023 and 1.033 respectively. The mean value of pH for marketed raw milk was 6.53 and 6.71 for fresh milk. Fat percentage results showed that all marketed raw milk samples analyzed were below the required standards for buffalo milk. Total bacterial count revealed mean of 7.29 x 10 10 /ml for marketed raw milk and 5.53 x 10 8 /ml for fresh milk. However all the samples contained total count above the standard i.e., 2 x 10 5 to 5 x 10 6 /ml and all the samples were of very poor quality and placed in grade D. The present study indicated that qualitative and quantitative changes during transportation of milk to consumers were due substandard production of fresh milk and probably due to adulteration.