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It's an exciting week for all of us here at Basepaws – we updated our breed database! With your help, we are inching closer and closer to making breakthroughs in feline genetics and improving the lives of our beloved kitties.
Meet Sami. This loving and adorable fellow is one of four cats that Basepaws community member, Giuliano Argenti, rescued and welcomed into his family. At the wise age of 19, Sami is living a healthy and full life—yet this wasn’t always the case. Learn about how the Basepaws Oral Health Test helped Guiliano and his veterinarian save Sami’s pearly whites, and ultimately, his life. It’s a story with a happy ending that gives us all something to smile about!
Acute Intermittent Porphyria in Cats: Background, Breeds at Risk, Symptoms, Diagnosis, and Treatment
Porphyrias is a term for a group of rare metabolic disorders that affect a cat’s ability to produce heme. Heme is an essential part of hemoglobin—a protein found in red blood cells that brings oxygen from a cat’s lungs to other parts of their body. Different types of porphyrias can occur in cats, as well as in humans and other animals. In this blog, we’ll discuss acute intermittent porphyria (AIP) in cats, its symptoms, and how it is diagnosed and treated by veterinarians.
Pyruvate kinase is an enzyme involved in the metabolism of red blood cells. When mutations in the PKLR gene occur, it reduces the functionality of this enzyme and subsequently affects the ability of red blood cells to survive and function properly. Learn about pyruvate kinase deficiency in cats, symptoms and treatment, and the cat breeds that are known to be at a higher risk for this condition.
From time to time, we update the Basepaws digital report of results for our Breed + Health Cat DNA Test. Today, we’d like to take a moment to share some details about two recent changes to our report—one for a genetic health marker linked to the common cat heart condition hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, and one for a genetic trait marker associated with the Siamese colorpoint coat pattern.
Today, we’re decoding one of the mysteries of genetics that relates to your Basepaws DNA report of results. It's called epistasis. When epistasis occurs, the observable expression (phenotype) of a gene—such as one responsible for the color of your kitty's coat—gets modified in some way by a completely different gene that has the ability to mask, suppress, or inhibit how that coat color gene is expressed. Epistasis helps explain why sometimes you may get a “likely to have” result for a genetic trait in your cat’s Basepaws report that doesn’t quite match up with their physical appearance.
The breed analysis that you receive from a Basepaws Breed + Health Cat DNA test offers an exciting glimpse into your cat’s DNA story, yet much of it remains to be told. This includes a definitive story of ancestry, which is difficult to pin down for cats. In today’s post, we’d like to share some insight into why this is, and to explain the concept of genomic similarity that is at the heart of the Basepaws breed analysis.
In this post, Basepaws shares important changes to its Cat DNA Test digital report. Learn about recent updates to genetic health markers, such as for the heart condition hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, and fun information about cat coat genetics.
