Transcriptomic analysis of abomasal mucosa of resistant and susceptible suckling lambs experimentally infected with Haemonchus contortus

Several studies have shown some genes as potential biological markers for sheep resistance using molecular tools, including transcriptomic analysis. In this study, we sequenced the polyadenylated RNA of the abomasal tissue of Santa Ines and Ile de France suckling lambs to identify mucosa-specific transcript alterations between breeds artificially infected with H. contortus. Our results showed many candidate genes that could be used as selectable markers of resistance in Santa Ines sheep as well as other native and commercial sheep breeds. Although we used an experimental infection, our model may have some similarities with a natural infection, once our results showed that suckling lambs had the ability to modulate their immune response against H. contortus .