Comparison of Evolutionary Relationship of Partial cDNA Sequences of NPY,POMC and CART Genes in Tupaia belangeri

Key words: 
• Tupaia belangeri /
• NPY /
• CART /
• POMC /
• hypothalamus

Abstract: Neuropeptide Y（NPY）,pro-opiomelanocortin（POMC） and cocaine and amphetamine regulated transcript peptide（CART） are hypothalamic neuropeptides that play essential roles in the regulation of energy homeostasis,which is highly conserved in evolution and can accurately reflect the distant genetic relationship between species. Partial cDNA sequences of Tupaia belangeri NPY,POMC and CART genes were obtained by using the RT-PCR method. The resultant partial sequences of NPY,POMC and CART were 133 bp,276 bp and 50 bp in length,respectively,which contain open reading frames（ORF） of 131 bp,272 bp and 48 bp,separately. The proteins encoding these sequences included 43 amino acids in NPY,90 amino acids in POMC and 16 amino acids in CART. A search of the BLAST database showed that the deduced sequences of NPY,POMC and CART from T. belangeri were very similar to those of Callithrix jacchus,Macaca mulatta,Pongo abelii,Homo sapiens,Papio Anubis,Otolemur garnettii,Nomascus leucogenys,Cricetulus griseus and Rattus norveqicus. A phylogenetic tree was constructed with the NPY,POMC and CART genes to determine the evolutional position of T. belangeri by using ML method. The result showed that T. belangeri has a close relationship with primates.