Genetic dissection of a behavioral quantitative trait locus shows that Rgs2 modulates anxiety in mice.
Here we present a strategy to determine the genetic basis of variance in complex phenotypes that arise from natural, as opposed to induced, genetic variation in mice. We show that a commercially available strain of outbred mice, MF1, can be treated as an ultrafine mosaic of standard inbred strains and accordingly used to dissect a known quantitative trait locus influencing anxiety. We also show that this locus can be subdivided into three regions, one of which contains Rgs2, which encodes a regulator of G protein signaling. We then use quantitative complementation to show that Rgs2 is a quantitative trait gene. This combined genetic and functional approach should be applicable to the analysis of any quantitative trait.
Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics, University of Oxford, Roosevelt Drive, Oxford OX3 7BN, UK.
Binnaz
B
Yalcin
Saffron A G
SA
Willis-Owen
Jan
J
Fullerton
Anjela
A
Meesaq
Robert M
RM
Deacon
J Nicholas P
JN
Rawlins
Richard R
RR
Copley
Andrew P
AP
Morris
Jonathan
J
Flint
Richard
R
Mott
D000818:Animals; D021461:Animals, Outbred Strains; D001007:Anxiety / Q000235:genetics*; D001483:Base Sequence; D002874:Chromosome Mapping / Q000379:methods*; D005816:Genetic Complementation Test; D051379:Mice; D008815:Mice, Inbred Strains; D009030:Mosaicism; D019655:Quantitative Trait, Heritable; D020710:RGS Proteins / Q000235:genetics / Q000502:physiology*
D020710:RGS Proteins; C105345:Rgs2 protein, mouse