Epigenetics

DNA methylation related to age in cattle using Oxford Nanopore Technology and Reduced Representation Bisulfite Sequencing

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Abstract

Abstract Text: DNA methylation is one of the most widely studied epigenetic modifications, altering gene expression without changing the underlying DNA sequence. In mammals, DNA methylation is a common epigenetic mark that occurs primarily at CpG dinucleotides. Reduced Representation Bisulphite Sequencing (RRBS) can detect methylation at single-base-pair resolution in CpG-rich regions (CpG islands), thereby reducing costs compared with the gold-standard whole-genome bisulphite sequencing (WGBS). More recently, studies have also demonstrated that Oxford Nanopore Technologies (ONT) can accurately identify methylated sites, with high correlation to gold-standard methylation technologies. In this study, we profiled methylation using ONT and compared the results with RRBS data. Our findings indicated that ONT detected substantially more methylated sites across the genome than RRBS, ranging from 15.01 million to 20.66 million sites. Given the large number of methylated sites captured by ONT, the high correlation with RRBS at overlapping sites, streamlined library preparation, high mapping efficiency, and the slightly clearer separation between age groups observed with ONT relative to RRBS, ONT appears to be a promising approach for methylation profiling and for building age-prediction models.

Keywords: 2026

How to Cite:

James, J., Hayes, B., Guo, Y., Ross, E. & Nguyen, L., (2026) “DNA methylation related to age in cattle using Oxford Nanopore Technology and Reduced Representation Bisulfite Sequencing”, World Congress on Genetics Applied to Livestock Production Digital Archive 2026(1): 2286351. doi: https://doi.org/10.31274/wcgalp.24586

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