Identical marker alleles in Podolic cattle (Bos taurus) and Indian zebu (Bos indicus)

In the context of biochemical marker research and in order to add new infor mation on native breeds, the present work focuses on a local Southern Italy cattle, namely Italian Podolic. We provide the complete structural charact erisation of alpha-lactalbumins and beta-globin chains isolated from Podoli c cattle (Bos taurus). Given the unavailability of the complete sequence fo r alpha-lactalbumin A of taurine cattle in the literature, we intended to c heek its structure in order to ascertain the absence of any possible silent mutation. Screening the Podolic cattle, we found a new beta-globin variant not detectable by conventional methods. The presence of such a new variant might be helpful in the study of the Podolic population genetic structure and for a better knowledge of the gene pool per se, and ill comparison with the other breads. Structural analyses showed that the new beta-globin Podo lic variant exhibited the same sequence as beta-globin A(zebu). Thr alpha-l actalbumin A was the same as that isolated from zebu cattle (Bos indicus). The results are discussed in relation to the possible involvement of the tw o markers in the debate on the origin of the Podolic breed. (C) 2000 Elsevi er Science Inc. All rights reserved.