The effect of glycerol on mRNA expression of growth hormone, insulin-like growth factor, and mitochondrial breast muscle genes of Japanese quail

Abstract

1. A study was carried out to evaluate the expression of growth hormone (GH), insulin-like growth factor I (IGF-I), mitochondrial adenine nucleotide translocase (ANT), cytochrome oxidase III (COX III) and avian uncoupling protein (avUCP) genes in 14-d-old Japanese quail that were fed different levels of glycerol (0%, 4%, and 12% dietary glycerol) which replaced maize as an energy source. 2. Total RNA was extracted from the breast muscle, and cDNA was amplified using real-time PCR with primers specific to the examined genes. 3. Quail fed the diet with 12% glycerol supplementation presented higher growth hormone (GH) mRNA expression than did those fed 0% glycerol. Supplementation with 12% glycerol negatively influenced IGF-I mRNA expression and reduced ANT mRNA expression in comparison with the treatment with no glycerol. COX III mRNA expression in the pectoralis superficialis muscle was decreased by 26% in quail fed 12% glycerol compared with those fed 0 and 4% glycerol. 4. There was no difference in UCP mRNA expression between quail fed 0 and 4% glycerol; however, UCP expression was reduced (73%) in birds fed the 12% glycerol diet compared with the level in those fed the 4% glycerol diet. 5. The inclusion of 4% glycerol in the diet produced results similar to those of the diet with no glycerol. Based on quail performance and the expression of the GH, IGF-I, ANT, COX III and UCP genes, 4% glycerol can be used in quail feeding without any harmful effects.

Effect of glycerol on GHR and IGF-1 gene expression in breast muscle and on growth of Japanese meat quails

“…Nevertheless, such growth was not observed probably due to the observed increase in digesta passage rate, which may have determined lower utilization of other dietary components. Gasparino et al (2012a) observed reduced IGF-1 expression in 14-day-old Japanese quails fed 12% glycerol, but this was not observed in the present study, suggesting that 28-day-old quails may have developed a mechanism of adaptation to the diet with this glycerol level.…”

“…Glycerol is passively absorbed (Guyton, 1991), and it has a sweet flavor and low molecular weight (Rivaldi et al, 2008). The dietary inclusion of glycerol may affect the performance of Japanese quails (Raber et al, 2009), and in addition, it may influence the mRNA expression of some hormones and receptors related to growth, such as GH (growth hormone), IGF-1 (insulin-like growth factor), and GHR (growth hormone receptor) (Gasparino et al, 2012a). Changes in the expression of these genes may affect nutrient utilization and basal metabolism, changing energy expenditure and, consequently, influencing heat increment (Johnson et al, 2003;Bottje and Carstens, 2009).…”

Acute heat stress and dietary methionine effects on IGF-I, GHR, and UCP mRNA expression in liver and muscle of quails

“…In addition to environmental temperature (Gabillard et al, 2003(Gabillard et al, , 2006, studies show that the expression of growth-related hormones, such as insulin-like growth factor I (IGF-I) and growth hormone receptor (GHR), may be influenced by other factors, such as nutrition (Katsumata et al, 2002;Gasparino et al, 2012). According to Kimball and Jefferson (2004), amino acids play a key role in regulating some cellular processes, such as the regulation of gene expression by mRNA modulation.…”

Dietary glycerol for quail: association between productive performance and COX III mRNA expression

“…COX activity can be modified in response to different treatments, (Scheffler, 1999;You et al, 2002), for this reason, COX has great importance in researches of mitochondrial energy efficiency. Changes in cellular efficiency may be due to lower expression of this gene (Kemp et al, 2003), resulting in animals being less efficient at converting food into body weight (Gasparino et al, 2012).…”

“…Inclusion of glycerol in the diet of quails and broiler chicken may affect their performance characteristics (Raber et al, 2009) as well as influencing mRNA expression of some mitochondrial genes related to the efficiency of ATP synthesis, such as Cytochrome oxidase subunit III (COX III) (Gasparino et al, 2012).…”