Conclusions

The aim of this study was to characterize the selenoproteins present in the genome of the problem species Odocoileus virginianus texanus, comparing its genome to selenoproteins present in the species Equus caballus. We completed the study with proteins from Homo sapiens, as they are generally better annotated.

We were able to characterized 37 proteins in Odocoileus virginianus texanus genome, which include selenoproteins, homologous proteins and proteins involved in selenoprotein biosynthesis machinery. 22 of these proteins are Selenoproteins also conserved in all mammals: Sel15, DIO1-3, GPx1-4, GPx6, SelH, Sell, SelK, SelM, SelN, SelO, SelP, MsrB1 (SelR), SelS, SelT, SelWa and TXNRD2-3. However, we could not characterize the protein TXNRD1, which is also conserved in mammals according to literature (13).

Regarding the cysteine homologous proteins, we found eight proteins that had lost its selenocysteine residue: MsrA, GPx5, GPx7-8, MSRB2-3 and SelU1-2.

Some of the proteins we found in our problem species are involved in the synthesis and translation of selenoproteins, which are also conserved among mammals: eEFsec, PSTK, SBP2, SecS, SEPSH2 (SPS2), SEPSH1 (SPS1) and SECp43.

Besides, we found some other proteins that we were not able to characterize, as we explained in the discussion. These proteins were SelOa, SelOb, DIOa, GPxa, GPxc, SelWb, TXNRDa, SebP2a and SBP2b. The difficulty to characterize this proteins was, in part, due to a poor characterization of the species Equus caballus in SelenoDB.

To sum up, we got to characterize many selenoproteins in Odocoileus virginianus texanus genome, although we found many limitations during the project. Firstly, we were given an incomplete reference genome that postponed the obtention of meaningful results. Moreover, the incomplete annotation of Equus caballus in the selenoprotein database made more difficult the characterization of some proteins as previously mentioned. Secondly, as we did not perform an exhaustive exonerate and might have not indicate a proper length for fastasubseq, some of the SECIS element were not found and the exon number for some proteins were not consistent with the Seblastian prediction.

Taking into account the previous imitation exposed, further studies would be needed to complete the characterization of the selenoproteome of Odocoileus virginianus texanus.