About the Authors

Sitao Wu

Affiliation Center for Research in Biological Systems, University of California San Diego, San Diego, California, United States of America

Robert W. Li

robert.li@ars.usda.gov

Affiliation United States Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, Bovine Functional Genomics Laboratory, Beltsville, Maryland, United States of America

Weizhong Li

Affiliation Center for Research in Biological Systems, University of California San Diego, San Diego, California, United States of America

Ethiopia Beshah

Affiliation United States Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, Diet, Genomics, and Immunology Laboratory, Beltsville, Maryland, United States of America

Harry D. Dawson

Affiliation United States Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, Diet, Genomics, and Immunology Laboratory, Beltsville, Maryland, United States of America

Joseph F. Urban Jr

Affiliation United States Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service, Diet, Genomics, and Immunology Laboratory, Beltsville, Maryland, United States of America

Competing Interests

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: RWL. Performed the experiments: RWL EB HDD JFU. Analyzed the data: SW WL RWL. Wrote the paper: RWL.