Vitiligo is an autoimmune disease that causes patches of skin to lose melanocytes, which give the skin its color. Grey horses are primarily affected by this condition around their eyes, muzzle and anus; vitiligo gives the skin a mottled appearance. Scientists who have identified the genes most likely to cause the disorder say that the same genes may also play a role in melanoma risk.
Humans affected by vitiligo have multiple genes involved in the disease – up to 322 of them. Several of these genes have been shown to be involved in malignant melanoma susceptibility in humans.
Equine research has not shown what genes cause the disorder in horses. Dr. Thomas Druml and researchers from the University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna, the University of Sydney, the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, the Slovak University of Agriculture, and the University of Paris-Saclay used genetic data from 152 Lipizzaners and 104 solid-colored Norikers (an Austrian draft horse) to try to identify the genes involved in the disorder.
The scientists visually inspected study horses for vitiligo and found that 33 of the Lipizzaners (21.7 percent) had the condition. Upon investigation, they found several candidate genes on four chromosomes that seemed to play a role in vitiligo development in grey horses. Four of the genes are associated with the immune system and four play a role in tumor suppression and metastasis, which is how cancer cells spread.
The researchers also found that grey horses with a particular gene mutation (STX17) are more likely to develop melanoma. Melanoma occurs in 46.1 to 50 percent of grey Lipizzaners.
The scientists concluded that a relationship exists between the depigmentation phenotype and melanoma in grey horses. They recommend more gene-specific expression and replication studies be completed on different breeds.
Read the study here.
Read more at HorseTalk.
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