Comparative bioinformatics analysis of mtDNA conserved regions enhancing molecule absolute quantification of ovine...

Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) plays a key role as a "Molecular ID" in the field of authentication of animal food ingredients. However, mtDNA sequences are highly mutable, making comparative analyses more difficult and leading to the inaccuracy of detection. In this study, bioinformatics techniques were employed to analyze ovine and porcine mtDNA sequences in depth. The analysis revealed high concordance between the two mitochondrial sequences, spanning a range of 0-12,000 bp. Based on this finding, a digital PCR based single-molecule absolute quantification technology for ovine and porcine components was successfully established. This method demonstrated excellent linearity over a dynamic range (sheep, from 13 copies/μL to 42,633 copies/μL; pig, from 36 copies/μL to 55,600 copies/μL) spanning four orders of magnitude (R² ≥ 0.99). The LODs for sheep and pigs were 13 copies/μL and 12 copies/μL, and the LOQs were 29 copies/μL and 15 copies/μL, respectively. This study provides valuable genomic resources for the study of conserved regions in ovine and porcine mtDNA, and also paves a new technical pathway for the identification and detection of animal food ingredients.