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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Nutr.
Sec. Nutrition and Metabolism
Volume 12 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fnut.2025.1524242

Crossbreeding Simmental with Mongolian, and Holstein cattle can improve feed efficiency and energy metabolism by upregulating COX3 and downregulating PRSS2 gene expression

Provisionally accepted
Yi Wu Yi Wu Pengfei Zhao Pengfei Zhao Xiaorui Li Xiaorui Li Mingke Huangfu Mingke Huangfu Zhimeng Chen Zhimeng Chen Chunjie Wang Chunjie Wang Hao Chen Hao Chen *Aorigele Chen Aorigele Chen
  • Inner Mongolia Agricultural University, Hohhot, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    The selective breeding of beef cattle plays an important role in meeting the growing demand for beef and improving production performance. This study used fattened cattle of the Simmental (S) breed, and two crossbreeds: Simmental × Mongolian (SM) and Simmental × Holstein (SH), which were healthy, of similar age and weight. The results showed that the blood glucose (GLU) levels of the crossbred, genetically improved SM and SH groups were higher than that of the S group.Compared with the S group, there were 49 differentially expressed genes (DEGs) in the SM group, of which 18 genes were up-regulated and 31 genes were downregulated; and 1031 DEGs in the SH group, of which 251 genes were up-regulated and 780 genes were down-regulated. We found that crossbreeding may increase GLU levels in the blood by upregulating cytochrome C oxidase subunit 3 (COX3) gene expression and downregulating of PRSS2 , providing glycogen to the organism, and therefore enhancing GLU-converting capacity. This study highlighted the differences in feed utilisation and energy metabolism among crossbred breeds and provides theoretical support for crossbreeding as a means of selecting breeds and improving beef cattle production. However, the expression of the genes were not validated in the present experiments, and these results need further validation.

    Keywords: Energy Metabolism, Cattle, breed, RNA sequencing, Glucose

    Received: 07 Nov 2024; Accepted: 05 Feb 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 Wu, Zhao, Li, Huangfu, Chen, Wang, Chen and Chen. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Hao Chen, Inner Mongolia Agricultural University, Hohhot, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.