A simple multiplex polymerase chain reaction to determine ABO blood types of rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta)

Rhesus macaques are the most common nonhuman primate model organism used in biomedical research. Their increasingly frequent use as subjects in studies involving transplantation requires that blood and other tissue antigens of donors and recipients be compatible. We report here an easy and rapid multiplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) to determine the ABO blood group phenotypes of rhesus macaques that can be performed with only small amounts of DNA. We phenotyped 78 individuals and found this species to exhibit the A, B and AB phenotypes in frequencies that vary by geographic region. The probability of randomly pairing rhesus macaque donors and recipients that exhibit major ABO phenotype incompatibility is approximately 0.35 and 0.45 for Indian and Chinese rhesus macaques, respectively.