Molecular Characterization, Expression and Functional Analysis of Chicken.

Abstract

Innate immunity is an essential line of defense against pathogen invasion which is gained at birth, and the mechanism involved is mainly to identify pathogen-associated molecular patterns through pattern recognition receptors.(stimulator of interferon genes) is a signal junction molecule that hosts the perception of viral nucleic acids and produces type I interferon response, which plays a crucial role in innate immunity. However, relatively few studies have investigated the molecular characterization, tissue distribution, and potential function ofin chickens. In this study, we cloned the full-length cDNA of chickenthat is composed of 1341 bp. Sequence analyses revealed thatcontains a 1140-bp open-reading frame that probably encodes a 379-amino acid protein. Multiple sequence alignments showed that the similarity of the chickengene to other birds is higher than that of mammals. Real-time polymerase chain reaction (PCR) assays revealed thatis highly expressed in the spleen, thymus and bursa of fabricious in chickens. Furthermore, we observed thatexpression was significantly upregulated both in vitro and in vivo following infection with Newcastle disease virus (NDV).expression was also significantly upregulated in chicken embryo fibroblasts upon stimulation with poly(I:C) or poly(dA:dT). Taken together, these findings suggest thatplays an important role in antiviral signaling pathways in chickens.