UC Davis

Understanding and treating human diseases require valid animal models. Leveraging the genetic diversity in rhesus macaque populations across eight primate centers in the United States, we conduct targeted-sequencing on 1845 individuals for 374 genes linked to inherited human retinal and neurodevelopmental diseases. We identify over 47,000 single nucleotide variants, a substantial proportion of which are shared with human populations. By combining rhesus and human allele frequencies with established variant prediction methods, we develop a machine learning-based score that outperforms established methods in predicting missense variant pathogenicity. Remarkably, we find a marked number of loss-of-function variants and putative deleterious variants, which may lead to the development of rhesus disease models. Through phenotyping of macaques carrying a pathogenic OPA1:p.A8S variant, we identify a genetic model of autosomal dominant optic atrophy. Finally, we present a public website housing variant and genotype data from over two thousand rhesus macaques.