Mitochondrial DNA D ‐loop haplogroup contributions to the genetic diversity of East European domestic chickens from Russia
Summary To elucidate geographical and historical aspects of chicken dispersal across Eastern Europe, we analysed the complete mitochondrial DNA D‐loop sequence of 86 representatives from chicken breeds traditionally raised in the territory of the East European Plain (Orloff, Pavlov, Russian White, Yurlov Crower, Uzbek Game and Naked Neck). From the 1231–1232 bp D‐loop sequence, 35 variable sites that defined 22 haplotypes were identified in modern chicken. All populations, except Uzbek Game, exhibited high values of haplotype and nucleotide diversity suggesting a wide variation in maternal diversity. Inclusion of mt...
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - December 17, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: A.G. Dyomin, M.I. Danilova, J.M. Mwacharo, A.E. Masharsky, A.V. Panteleev, A.S. Druzhkova, V.A. Trifonov, S.A. Galkina Tags: Original Article Source Type: research

Genetic diversity of the Mexican Lidia bovine breed and its divergence from the Spanish population
In conclusion, as the Mexican Lidia population had initially a small number of founders and its current population has been reared isolated from their Spanish ancestors since a long time, these bottleneck effects and a combination of mixed cattle origin are the factors that might erase any trace of the Spanish origin of this population. (Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics)
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - November 30, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: P.G. Eusebi, O. Cort és, S. Dunner, J. Cañón Tags: ORIGINAL ARTICLE Source Type: research

Improving production efficiency in the presence of genotype by environment interactions in pig genomic selection breeding programmes
Summary We simulated a genomic selection pig breeding schemes containing nucleus and production herds to improve feed efficiency of production pigs that were cross‐breed. Elite nucleus herds had access to high‐quality feed, and production herds were fed low‐quality feed. Feed efficiency in the nucleus herds had a heritability of 0.3 and 0.25 in the production herds. It was assumed the genetic relationships between feed efficiency in the nucleus and production were low (rg = 0.2), medium (rg = 0.5) and high (rg = 0.8). In our alternative breeding schemes, different proportion of production animals were recorded ...
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - November 30, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: K.G. Nirea, T.H.E. Meuwissen Tags: Original Article Source Type: research

Genomic evaluation of regional dairy cattle breeds in single ‐breed and multibreed contexts
Summary An important prerequisite for high prediction accuracy in genomic prediction is the availability of a large training population, which allows accurate marker effect estimation. This requirement is not fulfilled in case of regional breeds with a limited number of breeding animals. We assessed the efficiency of the current French routine genomic evaluation procedure in four regional breeds (Abondance, Tarentaise, French Simmental and Vosgienne) as well as the potential benefits when the training populations consisting of males and females of these breeds are merged to form a multibreed training population. Genomic ev...
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - November 30, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: D. J ónás, V. Ducrocq, S. Fritz, A. Baur, M.‐P. Sanchez, P. Croiseau Tags: Original Article Source Type: research

Genetic parameter estimates for prenatal and postnatal mortality in Nellore cattle
Summary The aim of this study was to estimate genetic parameters for prenatal (PRE) and postnatal (POS) mortality in Nellore cattle. A total of 13 141 (PRE) and 17 818 (POS) records from Nellore females were used. PRE and POS were recorded using binary scale scores: a score of ‘1’ was given to calves that were born alive (PRE) and those that were alive at weaning (POS), and a score of ‘0’ was given to calves that were not alive at or around birth (PRE), as well as to those weighed at birth but not at weaning (POS). The relationship matrix included 698 sires, 107 paternal grandsires and 69 maternal grandsires. Dat...
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - November 30, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: L.C. Magalh ães Silva, F. Baldi, C. Aboujaoude, G.C. Venturini, L.G. Albuquerque, M.J.R. Paranhos da Costa Tags: Original Article Source Type: research

Estimation of total genetic effects for survival time in crossbred laying hens showing cannibalism, using pedigree or genomic information
Summary Mortality of laying hens due to cannibalism is a major problem in the egg‐laying industry. Survival depends on two genetic effects: the direct genetic effect of the individual itself (DGE) and the indirect genetic effects of its group mates (IGE). For hens housed in sire‐family groups, DGE and IGE cannot be estimated using pedigree information, but the combined effect of DGE and IGE is estimated in the total breeding value (TBV). Genomic information provides information on actual genetic relationships between individuals and might be a tool to improve TBV accuracy. We investigated whether genomic information of...
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - November 23, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: T. Brinker, B. Raymond, P. Bijma, A. Vereijken, E.D. Ellen Tags: Original Article Source Type: research

Acknowledgements to referees
(Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics)
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - November 15, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Tags: Acknowledgements to Referees Source Type: research

The frontier spirit and reproducible research in animal breeding
(Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics)
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - November 15, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: R. J. Tempelman Tags: Editorial Source Type: research

Merging pedigree databases to describe and compare mating practices and gene flow between pedigree dogs in France, Sweden and the UK
In conclusion, the potential to reduce inbreeding within purebred dog populations through exchanging breeding animals across countries was confirmed by an improved effective population size when merging populations from different countries. (Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics)
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - September 30, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: S. Wang, G. Leroy, S. Malm, T. Lewis, E. Strandberg, W.F. Fikse Tags: Original Article Source Type: research

Genetic correlations between dressage, show jumping and studbook ‐entry inspection traits in a process of specialization in Dutch Warmblood horses
This study aimed to estimate genetic parameters to support decision‐making on specialization of breeding horses for dressage and show jumping in Dutch warmblood horses. Genetic correlations between performance of horses in dressage and show jumping were estimated as well as the genetic correlation between traits recorded during studbook‐entry inspections and performance in dressage and show jumping competitions. The information on competition comprised the performance of 82 694 horses in dressage and 62 072 horses in show jumping, recorded in the period 1993–2012. For 26 056 horses, information was available for b...
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - September 28, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: G. Rovere, B.J. Ducro, J.A.M. Arendonk, E. Norberg, P. Madsen Tags: Original Article Source Type: research

Estimates of the actual relationship between half ‐sibs in a pig population
Summary Genomic relationships based on markers capture the actual instead of the expected (based on pedigree) proportion of genome shared identical by descent (IBD). Several methods exist to estimate genomic relationships. In this research, we compare four such methods that were tested looking at the empirical distribution of the estimated relationships across 6704 pairs of half‐sibs from a cross‐bred pig population. The first method based on multiple marker linkage analysis displayed a mean and standard deviation (SD) in close agreement with the expected ones and was robust to changes in the minor allele frequencies (...
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - September 27, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: C.A. Garc ía‐Baccino, S. Munilla, A. Legarra, Z.G. Vitezica, N.S. Forneris, R.O. Bates, C.W. Ernst, N.E. Raney, J.P. Steibel, R.J.C. Cantet Tags: Original Article Source Type: research

Use of molecular markers to improve relationship information in the genetic evaluation of beef cattle tick resistance under pedigree ‐based models
Summary The selection of genetically superior individuals is conditional upon accurate breeding value predictions which, in turn, are highly depend on how precisely relationship is represented by pedigree. For that purpose, the numerator relationship matrix is essential as a priori information in mixed model equations. The presence of pedigree errors and/or the lack of relationship information affect the genetic gain because it reduces the correlation between the true and estimated breeding values. Thus, this study aimed to evaluate the effects of correcting the pedigree relationships using single‐nucleotide polymorphism...
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - September 23, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: V.S. Junqueira, F.F. Cardoso, M.M. Oliveira, B.P. Sollero, F.F. Silva, P.S. Lopes Tags: Original Article Source Type: research

Estimation of genetic (co)variances of Gompertz growth function parameters in pigs
The objective of this study was to estimate genetic (co)variances for the Gompertz growth function parameters, asymptotic mature weight (A), the ratio of mature weight to birthweight (B) and rate of maturation (k), using alternative modelling approaches. The data set consisted of 51 893 live weight records from 10 201 growing pigs. The growth of each pig was modelled using the Gompertz model employing either a two‐step fixed effect or mixed model approach or a one‐step mixed model approach using restricted maximum likelihood for the estimation of genetic (co)variance. Heritability estimates for the Gompertz growth fu...
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - September 14, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: J.M. Coyne, K. Matilainen, D.P. Berry, M. – L. Sevon‐Aimonen, E.A. Mäntysaari, J. Juga, T. Serenius, N. McHugh Tags: Original Article Source Type: research

Novel harmful recessive haplotypes for reproductive traits in pigs
Summary Harmful recessive haplotypes for reproductive and fertility traits have previously been detected in cattle, but so far, no studies have been published for pigs. The aim of this study was to locate chromosomal regions with putative lethal haplotypes and estimate the effects of the identified haplotypes on reproductive traits in the Finnish Yorkshire pig breed. We used marker genotypes of 871 Finnish Yorkshire AI boars, genotyped with Illumina's PorcineSNP60 BeadChip. The analysed traits were number of stillborn piglets in first (NSB1) and later (NSB2) parities, total number of piglets born in first and later paritie...
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - September 12, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: J. H äggman, P. Uimari Tags: Original Article Source Type: research

Estimation of genetic variance in the age of genomics
(Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics)
Source: Journal of Animal Breeding and Genetics - September 11, 2016 Category: Genetics & Stem Cells Authors: J. Jensen Tags: Editorial Source Type: research