Lower Antibody Response in Chickens Homozygous for the Mx Resistant Allele to Avian Influenza

• Published in: Asian-australasian journal of animal sciences Vol. 22; no. 4; pp. 465 - 470
• Main Authors: Qu, L.J, Li, X.Y, Xu, G.Y, Ning, Z.H, Yang, N
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: Korean
• Published: 2009
• Subjects: Antibody Response; Mx Gene; Disease Resistance; Avian Influenza; Chick
• ISSN: 1011-2367; 1976-5517

The chicken Mx gene has been regarded as a candidate gene for resistance to avian influenza virus (AIV). In this study, three groups of chickens with homozygotes (AA, GG) and heterozygotes (AG) of the resistant (A) and susceptible alleles (G) to AIV of the Mx gene were constructed from a line of dwarf egg-type chickens. These chickens were not examined for their resistant activities to AIV because the differential resistance had only been detected in vitro. The birds of the three groups were vaccinated with inactivated H5N2 AIV vaccine and the level of hemagglutination inhibition (HI) antibody to AIV was detected. The association between disease resistant activity to AIV and antibody response to AIV vaccination in the three groups was analyzed. The chickens with homozygous resistant allele A showed the lowest antibody levels, whereas the heterozygous chickens (AG) presented the highest antibody level after the boosting vaccination, which indicates that the efficiency of artificial selection on the resistant allele of Mx gene will be compromised since the homozygotes of the allele presented the weakest antibody response to the corresponding vaccine.