Figure 2

Visual representation of the changes in global gene expression in ovine skeletal muscle during late fetal and postnatal development. Affymetrix MAS5 data were globally scaled to 200 on each microarray and normalized across all microarrays to enable visualization of the expression of all genes. Each analysis time point consisted of triplicate samples, and the mean for each developmental stage is presented. The genes are differentially colored according to their normalized expression intensity relative to the global gene intensity at 80 days of fetal development. Genes with mean intensities less than the global average at 80 days are colored green, while those with mean intensities greater than the global average at 80 days are colored red. Gene intensities that were not different from the 80 day fetal global mean are colored black. Genes represented by unsaturated colors were of low confidence according to a defined set of criteria. The ordinate shows the logarithm of the MAS5 intensity data while the abscissa corresponds to the five developmental stages i.e. 80, 100 and 120 days of fetal development, 150 days of development (i.e. 1-3 days after birth) and 230 days of development (young lamb).