title: Sex determination by SRY PCR and sequencing of Tasmanian devil facial tumour cell lines reveals non-allograft transmission.
abstract: Devil facial tumour disease (DFTD) is an infectious tumour disease and was hypothesised to be transmitted by allograft during biting based on two cytogenetic findings of DFTD tumours in 2006. It was then believed that DFTD tumours were originally from a female devil. In this study the devil sex-determining region Y (SRY) gene was PCR amplified and sequenced, and six pairs of devil SRY PCR primers were used for detection of devil SRY gene fragments in purified DFTD tumour cell lines. Using three pairs of devil SRY PCR primers, devil SRY gene sequence was detected by PCR and sequencing in genomic DNA of DFTD tumour cell lines from six male devils, but not from six female devils. Four out of six DFTD tumour cell lines from male devils contained nucleotides 288-482 of the devil SRY gene, and another two DFTD tumour cell lines contained nucleotides 381-577 and 493-708 of the gene, respectively. These results indicate that the different portions of the SRY gene in the DFTD tumours of the male devils were originally from the male hosts, rejecting the currently believed DFTD allograft transmission theory. The reasons why DFTD transmission was incorrectly defined as allograft are discussed.
authors.affiliation: Animal Health Laboratory, Department of Primary Industries, Parks, Water and Environment, 165 Westbury Road, Prospect, Tasmania 7250, Australia. Electronic address: Xianlan.Cui@dpipwe.tas.gov.au.
authors.forename: Xianlan
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Cui
authors.affiliation: Division of Avian Infectious Diseases, State Key Laboratory of Veterinary Biotechnology, Harbin Veterinary Research Institute, The Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Harbin, China. Electronic address: yfwang@hvri.ac.cn.
authors.forename: Yunfeng
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Animal Health Laboratory, Department of Primary Industries, Parks, Water and Environment, 165 Westbury Road, Prospect, Tasmania 7250, Australia.
authors.forename: Bobby
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Hua
authors.affiliation: Pennsylvania State University, Center for Comparative Genomics and Bioinformatics, University Park, PA 16802, USA.
authors.forename: Webb
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Miller
authors.affiliation: Division of Avian Infectious Diseases, State Key Laboratory of Veterinary Biotechnology, Harbin Veterinary Research Institute, The Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Harbin, China.
authors.forename: Yan
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.affiliation: Division of Avian Infectious Diseases, State Key Laboratory of Veterinary Biotechnology, Harbin Veterinary Research Institute, The Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Harbin, China.
authors.forename: Hongyu
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Cui
authors.affiliation: Division of Avian Infectious Diseases, State Key Laboratory of Veterinary Biotechnology, Harbin Veterinary Research Institute, The Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Harbin, China.
authors.forename: Xiangang
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Kong
mesh_terms: D064591:Allografts / Q000637:transplantation; D000818:Animals; D045744:Cell Line, Tumor; D005153:Facial Neoplasms / Q000235:genetics*; D005260:Female; D008297:Male; D008394:Marsupialia / Q000235:genetics*; D016133:Polymerase Chain Reaction / Q000379:methods*; D017422:Sequence Analysis, DNA / Q000379:methods*; D012727:Sex Characteristics; D012732:Sex Determination Analysis / Q000379:methods*; D051876:Sex-Determining Region Y Protein / Q000235:genetics*
chemical_list: D051876:Sex-Determining Region Y Protein
keywords: Aetiology; Devil facial tumour disease; PCR; SRY gene; Tasmanian devil