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Detection of Transgenic Atlantic and Coho Salmon by Real-time PCR

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Abstract

Genetic modifications (GM) have been applied to salmon to generate fast-growing strains for potential use in aquaculture. In November 2015, the first transgenic salmon (AquAdvantage® Atlantic salmon) was accepted for commercialization in the USA under defined conditions. The presence of GM food products in the marketplace stimulates the need for detection methods to allow screening for the presence of genetic modifications in seafood products. This paper first shows that it is possible to obtain amplifiable DNA from raw and processed products containing salmon. Detection methods by real-time PCR are proposed in this work. An endogenous gene target was designed to detect salmonid species DNA in samples. In addition, detection methods using real-time PCR were developed for two GM salmon possessing growth hormone transgenes: the AquAdvantage® Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) developed by AquaBounty for commercial purposes, and the coho salmon (Oncorhynchus kisutch) developed for research purposes by Fisheries and Oceans Canada. The methods are able to detect at least 20 copies of the target. It was found however that one of the construct-specific methods for the AquAdvantage® salmon detection did not work on AquAdvantage® genomic DNA even though it works on the sequence published in GenBank. The other assay however was found to reliably detect AquAdvantage® transgenic sequences in genomic DNA.

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Acknowledgments

This research was conducted within a Belgian research project (Convention RF 11/6242 UGMMONITOR) financed by the Belgian Federal Public Service for Public Health, Food Chain Safety and Environment. We also thank Cécile Ancion, Denis Roulez, and Gaëlle Antoine from the GMO team of CRA-W.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Unit Traceability and Authentication, Department Valorisation of Agricultural Products, Walloon Agricultural Research Center (CRA-W), 24, Chaussee de Namur, 5030, Gembloux, Belgium

    Frédéric Debode, Eric Janssen, Aline Marien & Gilbert Berben

  2. Fisheries and Oceans Canada, 4160 Marine Drive, West Vancouver, British Columbia, V7V 1N6, Canada

    Robert H. Devlin

  3. Federal Office of Consumer Protection and Food Safety (BVL), Mauerstraße, 39-42, 10117, Berlin, Germany

    Kathrin Lieske & Joachim Mankertz

Authors
  1. Frédéric Debode
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  2. Eric Janssen
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  4. Robert H. Devlin
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  5. Kathrin Lieske
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  6. Joachim Mankertz
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  7. Gilbert Berben
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Correspondence to Frédéric Debode.

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Conflict of Interest

Frédéric Debode declares that he has no conflict of interest. Eric Janssen declares that he has no conflict of interest. Aline Marien declares that she has no conflict of interest. Robert H. Devlin declares that he has no conflict of interest. Kathrin Lieske declares that she has no conflict of interest. Joachim Mankertz declares that he has no conflict of interest. Gilbert Berben declares that he has no conflict of interest.

Ethical Approval

This article does not contain studies with human or animal subjects. Samples used are food samples.

Electronic Supplementary Material

Figure S1

Placement of the primers and probes for salmon detection on the sequence of different salmonid species available in the NCBI database (Accession numbers of the sequences are given after the name). A. target proposed by Li et al. 2013 B. Target proposed in this study C. Target proposed by Ben Hafsa et al. 2016. (DOCX 298 kb)

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Debode, F., Janssen, E., Marien, A. et al. Detection of Transgenic Atlantic and Coho Salmon by Real-time PCR. Food Anal. Methods 11, 2396–2406 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12161-018-1214-1

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