Molecular Cloning,Sequence Analysis and Tissues Expression Profile of Part of Mink Toll-like Receptors (TLRs) Genes

The present study was aimed to explore the potential role of Toll-like receptors (TLRs) on the mink immunity, and accumulate alternative genetic material for the mink breeding for disease-resistant.Four pairs of primers were designed according to ferret TLR sequences in GenBank to obtain the sequences of TLR genes (TLR4, TLR6, TLR7 and TLR8) of mink and then performed bioinformatics analysis of these sequences.In addition, the expression of TLR4 and TLR7 genes in various tissues in young and adult minks were analyzed by RT-PCR. Sequence homology analysis showed that mink had higher homology with carnivora (ferrets, polar bear, panda, walrus, seals, dog, tiger and cat) which had the nearest perimeter in the phylogenetic tree.Tissue expression analysis showed that TLR4 and TLR7 were widely and differently expressed in variety tissues of mink.Interestingly, the expression of TLR4 and TLR7 in young mink were much higher than that in adult mink.