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Canine Mendelian disease record

Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (Discovered in the Dalmatian; ARDS)

Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (Discovered in the Dalmatian; ARDS). Autosomal recessive. Observed in 5 of 266 breeds tested in the Sniff Atlas, with measured carrier frequencies drawn from 242,627 dogs (Donner 2023). Per-dog phenotype outcome depends on penetrance, modifiers, and environment; the carrier frequencies below describe variant prevalence, not disease incidence.

OMIA identifier
OMIA:002539-9615
Autosomal recessive
Pathogenic
Source dataset
Sniff Atlas v1.0.1 / DOI

The Pathogenic grade describes the documented variant's causality, per the Animal Variant Classification Guidelines (AVCG; Boeykens et al. 2024, Front Vet Sci), an ACMG/AMP-style framework curated in OMIA. It grades the variant, not any individual dog. See the full classification table.

About this disease

From OMIA's curated record

Documented in OMIA (Online Mendelian Inheritance in Animals). This describes the disease as recorded in the published literature, not a prediction for any individual dog. As of 2026-06-03.

Clinical features

Tachypnea and noisy respiration. Shortly before death: respiratory distress, characterized by strenuous and rapid respirations, together with cyanosis and vomiting.

Molecular genetics

Holopainen et al. (2017) "combined SNP-based homozygosity mapping of two ARDS-affected Dalmatian dogs and whole genome sequencing of one affected dog to identify a case-specific homozygous nonsense variant, c.31C>T; p.R11* in the ANLN gene. Subsequent analysis of the variant in a total cohort of 188 Dalmatians, including seven cases, indicated complete segregation of the variant with the disease and confirmed an autosomal recessive mode of inheritance".

Inheritance

Eleven affected dogs were from 4 litters, all having a common ancestor. Segregation analysis suggested autosomal recessive inheritance. (Jarvinen et al., 2009)

Human analog

OMIA links this condition to the human gene record in OMIM (Mendelian Inheritance in Man), the place to read across to the deeper human literature for the same biology.

Source: OMIA (Nicholas, Tammen & the Sydney Informatics Hub), entry OMIA:002539-9615, doi:10.25910/2AMR-PV70 (CC-BY 4.0).

The evidence

Published references

The peer-reviewed papers behind this disease, curated by OMIA. Starred entries are OMIA-designated landmark papers.

  1. Lung injury leading to respiratory distress syndrome in young Dalmatian dogs · Journal of Veterinary Internal Medicine · 1995 · PMID 7674217

References curated by OMIA (Nicholas, Tammen & the Sydney Informatics Hub), doi:10.25910/2AMR-PV70 (CC-BY 4.0). Full list at the OMIA entry.

Predict a litter

Set each parent's status for Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (Discovered in the Dalmatian; ARDS) and see the odds for their puppies. Single recessive variant, exact Mendelian math.

Parent A
Parent B
NNClear
NmCarrier
NmCarrier
mmAffected
Clear25%
Carrier50%
Affected25%

These are the genetic odds for one known variant, not a promise: a real litter varies around them, and penetrance or other genes can change whether the condition ever appears. Use it to avoid pairing two carriers and to keep a line healthy, not to engineer a dog. Inheritance mode per OMIA.

Your breed

See what Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (Discovered in the Dalmatian; ARDS) looks like in your dog's breed.

Carrier frequency by breed

Top 5 well-sampled breeds (n ≥ 50)

Maximum per breed across variants in the Donner 2023 cohort, with . The list below is split into well-sampled breeds (n ≥ 50 tested) and small-sample breeds (n < 50, where the Wilson CI typically spans more than 20 percentage points and frequencies should not be compared directly to the well-sampled entries). Frequencies are population-level, not per-litter or per-line.

0%1%2%
Bloodhound0.18% · n 280
Bernese Mountain Dog<0.1% · n 954
Golden Retriever<0.1% · n 12,879
German Shepherd<0.1% · n 15,644
n = 72,544 dogs · Donner et al. 2023 carrier-screening cohort · Sniff Atlas
Each bar is one well-sampled breed; the whisker is its Wilson 95% CI, and fainter bars have wider intervals. Frequencies are population-level, not per-litter. Carrier status for Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome (Discovered in the Dalmatian; ARDS) is measured; phenotype outcome depends on penetrance and modifiers.
▸ Full table with Wilson 95% confidence intervals
Breed Carrier frequency n tested
Bloodhound 0.18% 280
Bernese Mountain Dog <0.1% 954
Golden Retriever <0.1% 12,879
German Shepherd <0.1% 15,644
American Staffordshire Terrier <0.1% 42,787

261 additional breeds in the Donner 2023 cohort were tested but showed no carriers.

Scope of this record

Scope

This record carries the breed-level carrier frequencies from the Donner 2023 cohort. Penetrance data (the fraction of at-risk dogs that develop the phenotype) is not yet quantified for this disease in the Sniff Atlas v1.0.1. The OMIA entry is the authoritative reference for the clinical phenotype, inheritance pattern, and gene assignment.

Predicted disease relevance at the per-dog level is UNPROVEN. The carrier frequency is measured; phenotype outcome depends on penetrance, environment, and modifier loci. Consult a veterinarian for clinical interpretation.

How to cite this record

Citations

If you use this record in published work, cite the Sniff Atlas (the published dataset that carries the breed-level carrier frequencies) and the upstream sources:

  • Sniff Atlas v1.0.1 for the per-breed carrier frequencies:

    Gehring, M. (2026). Sniff Atlas v1.0.1. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.20566358. CC-BY 4.0.

  • OMIA for the disease definition, inheritance, and gene assignment:

    Nicholas, F. W., & Tammen, I. (2024). OMIA. Sydney Informatics Hub, The University of Sydney. https://doi.org/10.25910/2AMR-PV70. Entry: OMIA:002539-9615.

  • Donner et al. 2023 for the breed × variant carrier-frequency cohort:

    Donner, J., Freyer, J., Davison, S., Anderson, H., Blades, M., Honkanen, L., et al. (2023). Genetic prevalence and clinical relevance of canine Mendelian disease variants in over one million dogs. PLOS Genetics, 19(2), e1010651. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pgen.1010651.

Full citation formats (BibTeX, RIS, CITATION.cff) at sniff.world/cite.

Related

Related

Last updated
Sources: Sniff Atlas v1.0.1 · OMIA OMIA:002539-9615 · Donner et al. 2023