Fine mapping of murine asthma quantitative trait loci and analyses of Ptgs1 and Mrc1 as positional candidate genes.

Asthma is a common respiratory disease that is driven by both genetic and environmental factors. Identification of the genes underlying asthma will provide insight into the mechanisms and treatment of this important disease. Previous studies in this laboratory identified two distinct quantitative trait loci for the asthma-related parameter, allergen-induced airway hyperresponsiveness, in a murine model by means of a genome-wide linkage analysis. The present study focuses and refines the map location of these two loci. Additionally, we explore prostaglandin-endoperoxide synthase-1 (Ptgs1) and mannose receptor C-type 1 (Mrc1) genes as two new positional candidate genes for allergen-induced airway hyperresponsiveness through comparative sequence analysis and mRNA expression studies of mouse strains with genetically mediated airway responsiveness.