Commercial farming of endangered wildlife has potential to reduce poaching pressure on wild populations. However, poached products can be laundered as farmed products. A method for separating farmed from wild products is therefore essential for effective law enforcement. Meat (skeletal muscle) is a wildlife product whose origin cannot be correctly determined. This short communication reports an epigenetic approach to achieve the distinction using the methylation rate of the promoter of the α-actinin-3 (ACTN3) gene in gluteus maximus tissues of feral (n = 21) and farmed (n = 21) American mink, Neovison vison. Our results showed that the accuracy of assignment ranged from 59.5 to 76.2% on each of six CpG sites/site groups. Combination of the six CpG sites/site groups achieved 83.3% overall correct assignment, 90.5% for the farmed group and 76.2% for the wild group. These data suggest the methylation rate of promoters of selected genes could be an effective indicator to distinguish farmed meat from wild meat of wildlife species.

中文翻译：

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野生还是养殖？利用ACTN3基因甲基化率和美国水貂确定野生动物肉起源的初步研究。

濒危野生动植物的商业化养殖有可能减轻对野生种群的偷猎压力。但是，水煮产品可以作为养殖产品进行洗涤。因此，将养殖产品与野生产品分离的方法对于有效执法至关重要。肉（骨骼肌）是一种野生生物产品，其来源无法正确确定。这段简短的交流报道了一种表观遗传学方法，该方法利用野生型（n  = 21）和养殖的（n  = 21）美国水貂的臀大肌组织中α-actinin-3（ACTN3）基因启动子的甲基化率来实现区分，Neovison Vison。我们的结果表明，在六个CpG网站/网站组中，每个网站的分配准确度从59.5％到76.2％。六个CpG站点/站点组的组合总体正确分配率为83.3％，养殖组为90.5％，野生组为76.2％。这些数据表明，所选基因启动子的甲基化率可能是区分野生肉和野生肉的有效指标。