In 2007 Joan Pontius from the Laboratory of Genomic Diversity (LGD) in the US, used the so-called "shotgun technique" to map 65% of Cinnamon the cat’s genome.
Cats where one of 26 mammals to be chosen selected by the National Human Genome Research Institute for "light" genome sequencing. Pontius extracted Cinnamon’s DNA and chopped it up into overlapping fragments, sequencing the pieces and then reassembling the letters into a continuous piece of information. this process is then repeated several times so that the 2.7 billion lettered sequence can be identified correctly. the term “light” genome means that Cinnamon's genome sequence was produces with only 1.9 passes, only obtaining 65% of the gene coding regions. which is “frustrating to think that maybe only 60% to 80% of the gene you are looking for will be there.”
Cinnamon the cat was chosen because she was hight inbred so she had fewer differences between her two sets of chromosomes so assembling the sequence so much easier.
so why cats? the sequence is useful for the study of human disease. more than 200 hereditary diseases are shared by cats and humans such as influenza, SARS and HIV.
Link to article: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn12857-inbred-cat-provides-first-feline-genome.html
By Sam Oliver
