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ARS Home » Northeast Area » Beltsville, Maryland (BARC) » Beltsville Agricultural Research Center » Animal Biosciences & Biotechnology Laboratory » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #317420
Title: Impact of broiler egg storage on relative expression of blastoderm genes

Author
item Bakst, Murray
item Fetterer, Raymond
item Welch, Glenn
item Miska, Kate

Submitted to: Meeting Abstract
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 5/30/2015
Publication Date: N/A
Citation: N/A

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Storage of hatching eggs by commercial broiler hatcheries is a common practice. However, continued storage beyond 7 days leads to an increase in early embryonic mortality due to the progressive increase in embryonic cell death. The cellular and molecular basis for this phenomenon is not known. A customized commercially available kit was used to analyze the expression of a panel of genes associated with oxidative stress, genetically programmed cell death (apoptosis), and fatty acid metabolism in RNA extracted from embryos isolated from unstored eggs, eggs stored for 21 days, and eggs stored for 21 days but subjected to three, 4 hr sessions of warming (37oC) on days 6, 12 and 18 of storage (SPIDES). The SPIDES treatment has been shown by us to increase the number of viable embryos by 8-10% after storage when compared to untreated stored eggs. By assigning the gene expression values of the embryos from unstored eggs as zero, the relative expression of the 29 genes examined in the two egg storage groups and control group were compared. The expression of fatty acid binding protein was significantly greater in the SPIDES treatment compared to either the control or the stored non-SPIDES embryo. In contrast, glutathione peroxidase, an anti-oxidant, was significantly greater in the non-SPIDES embryos compared to either the control or SPIDES embryo. No significant differences in the three treatments were observed for the remaining 18 of the genes examined. Once the molecular pathways leading to embryo mortality during egg storage are understood, it would be a matter of influencing the direction of that pathway though temperature manipulation, diet, or genetic selection to minimize embryonic mortality.