Immunoglobulin A deficiency (IgAD) is the most common primary immune deficiency disorder in both humans and dogs, characterized by recurrent mucosal tract infections and a predisposition for allergic and other immune mediated diseases. In several dog breeds, low IgA levels have been observed at a high frequency and with a clinical resemblance to human IgAD. In this study, we used genome-wide association studies (GWAS) to identify genomic regions associated with low IgA levels in dogs...

Diabetes mellitus is a serious health problem in both dogs and humans. Certain dog breeds show high prevalence of the disease, whereas other breeds are at low risk. Fructosamine and glycated hemoglobin (HbA1c) are two major biomarkers of glycaemia where serum concentrations reflect glucose turnover over the past few weeks to months. In this study, we searched for genetic factors influencing variation in serum fructosamine concentration in healthy dogs using data from nine dog breeds....

Cells respond to their environment by modulating protein levels through mRNA transcription and post-transcriptional control. Modest observed correlations between global steady-state mRNA and protein measurements have been interpreted as evidence that mRNA levels determine roughly 40% of the variation in protein levels, indicating dominant post-transcriptional effects. However, the techniques underlying these conclusions, such as correlation and regression, yield biased results when data are noisy, missing systematically, and collinear---properties of mRNA and protein measurements---which motivated us...

Bianchi, Dahlgren et al., Canine Hypothyroidism data