A first generation comparative chromosome map between guinea pig (Cavia porcellus) and humans

The domesticated guinea pig, Cavia porcellus (Hystricomorpha, Rodentia), is an important laboratory species and a model for a number of human diseases. Nevertheless, genomic tools for this species are lacking; even its karyotype is poorly characterized. The guinea pig belongs to Hystricomorpha, a widespread and important group of rodents; so far the chromosomes of guinea pigs have not been compared with that of other hystricomorph species or with any other mammals. We generated full sets of chromosome-specific painting probes for the guinea pig by flow sorting and microdissection, and for the first time, mapped the chromosomal homologies between guinea pig and human by reciprocal chromosome painting. Our data demonstrate that the guinea pig karyotype has undergone extensive rearrangements: 78 synteny-conserved human autosomal segments were delimited in the guinea pig genome. The high rate of genome evolution in the guinea pig may explain why the HSA7/16 and HSA16/19 associations presumed ancestral for eutherians and the three syntenic associations (HSA1/10, 3/19, and 9/11) considered ancestral for rodents were not found in C. porcellus. The comparative chromosome map presented here is a starting point for further development of physical and genetic maps of the guinea pig as well as an aid for genome assembly assignment to specific chromosomes. Furthermore, the comparative mapping will allow a transfer of gene map data from other species. The probes developed here provide a genomic toolkit, which will make the guinea pig a key species to unravel the evolutionary biology of the Hystricomorph rodents.