The extent of cis-regulation of gene expression and its influence on complex trait variation in cattle

Abstract

Cisregulatory genetic variation can cause variation in gene expression between individuals and between tissues. Allele-specific expression (ASE) and expression quantitative trait loci (eQTL) mapping have both been used to locate this cis regulation. Here we present two studies that utilize RNA sequence (RNaseq) data to gain insight into the genetic variation in complex traits, including gene expression and production traits in cattle, resulting from cis regulation of gene expression. The first study tested ASE in 18 tissues taken from a lactating cow and two tissues from 20 lactating cows. 89% of all genes tested (total 7985) in the single cow contained at least one SNP with significant (p <..