Abstract. The yak (Bos grunniens), a herbivore living on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau and its adjacent territories, is one of world’s most remarkable domestic animals. Over the past decades, research has been done on properties of yak meat at physiological and biochemical levels. In recent years, some candidate genes associating with meat quality and lipid metabolism in yak have been studied (MA et al. 2007, ZHONG et al. 2007). The Hormone Sensitive Lipase (LIPE) gene has been regarded as a candidate gene associating with lipid metabolism and meat quality. Several studies have reported the genetic variations in the LIPE genes of human and pig (TALMUD et al. 1998, KNOLL et al. 1998, WU et al. 1998, HARBITZ et al. 1999), whereas the yak LIPE gene polymorphism has not been investigated and no information is available. The aim of this study was to identify and characterize the genetic variation in Chinese yak LIPE at the DNA sequence level and genotyping of the polymorphism within LIPE in different yak breeds.