Inhibits Hepatic Lipid Synthesis and Correlates with Intramuscular Fatty Acid Composition, Body Weight and Carcass Traits in Chickens.

Stanniocalcin 2 (STC2) is a secreted glycoprotein involved in multiple biological processes. To systemically study the biological role of in chickens, phylogenetic tree analysis and conservation analysis were conducted. Association analysis between variations in the gene and the economic traits of Gushi-Anka F2 was conducted. The tissue expression patterns of expression in different chicken tissues and liver at different stages were detected. The biological role of in chicken liver was investigated through overexpression and interfering methods in the LMH cell line. Correlation analyses between expression and lipid components were conducted. (1) The phylogenetic tree displayed that chicken STC2 is most closely related with Japanese quail and most distantly related with Xenopus tropicalis. STC2 has the same identical conserved motifs as other species. (2) rs9949205 (T > C) found in intron was highly significantly correlated with chicken body weight at 0, 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 and 12 weeks ( < 0.01). Extremely significant correlations of rs9949205 with semi-evisceration weight (SEW), evisceration weight (EW), breast muscle weight (BMW), leg muscle weight (LMW), liver weight and abdominal fat weight (AFW) were revealed ( < 0.01). Significant associations between rs9949205 and abdominal fat percentage, liver weight rate, breast muscle weight rate and leg muscle weight rate were also found ( < 0.05). Individuals with TT or TC genotypes had significantly lower abdominal fat percentage and liver weight rate compared to those with the CC genotype, while their body weight and other carcass traits were higher. (3) showed a high expression level in chicken liver tissue, which significantly increased with the progression of age ( < 0.05). was observed to inhibit the content of lipid droplets, triglycerides (TG) and cholesterol (TC), as well the expression level of genes related to lipid metabolism in LMH cells. (4) Correlation analysis showed that the gene was significantly correlated with 176 lipids in the breast muscle ( < 0.05) and mainly enriched in omega-3 and omega-6 unsaturated fatty acids. In conclusion, the gene in chicken might potentially play a crucial role in chicken growth and development, as well as liver lipid metabolism and muscle lipid deposition. This study provides a scientific foundation for further investigation into the regulatory mechanism of the gene on lipid metabolism and deposition in chicken liver.