Efficient Target-Selected Mutagenesis in Zebrafish

Abstract

One of the most powerful methods available to assign function to a gene is to inactivate or knockout the gene. Recently,we described the first target-selected knockout in zebrafish. Here,we report on the further improvements of this procedure,resulting in a highly efficient and easy method to do target-selected mutagenesis in zebrafish. A library of 4608 ENU-mutagenized F1 animals was generated and kept as a living stock. The DNA of these animals was screened for mutations in 16 genes by use of CEL-I-mediated heteroduplex cleavage (TILLING) and subsequent resequencing. In total,255 mutations were identified,of which 14 resulted in a premature stop codon,7 in a splice donor/acceptor site mutation,and 119 in an amino acid change. By this method,we potentially knocked out 13 different genes in a few months time. Furthermore,we show that TILLING can be used to detect the full spectrum of ENU-induced mutations in a vertebrate genome with the presence of many naturally occurring polymorphisms.