ACTA VETERINARIA ET ZOOTECHNICA SINICA ›› 2015, Vol. 46 ›› Issue (3): 373-381.doi: 10.11843/j.issn.0366-6964.2015.03.004

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Genetic Analysis and Genome Wide Association Studies for Age at first Calving in Chinese Holsteins

LIU Ao-xing1, GUO Gang2, WANG Ya-chun1*, GUO Xiang-yu1,4, ZHANG Xu1,LIU Lin3,SHI Wan-hai3, LI Xi-zhi2,SU Guo-sheng4,ZHANG Qin1   

  1. (1.China Agricultural University,Beijing 100193,China;2.Beijing Sunlon Animal Husbandry Development Co.LTD,Beijing 100029,China;3.Beijing Dairy Cattle Center,Beijing 100085,China;4.Aarhus University,Tjele 8830,Denmark)
  • Received:2014-06-20 Online:2015-03-23 Published:2015-03-23

Abstract:

Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) based on high throughput SNPs genotyping technology provided basis for exploring genes associated with fertility traits in Chinese Holsteins.Data of 19 111 heifers with calving records over a period of 10 years (2001-2011) were collected from Sanyuanlühe Dairy Cattle Breeding Center.Firstly,by AI-REML combined EM algorithm,DMU software (v 6.0) was used to estimate genetic parameters for age at first calving (AFC) based on animal model.Then GWAS was performed by the software PLINK (v 1.07) on the basis of the EBVs of calving traits of 2 172 Chinese Holstein heifers to identify genes affecting the fertility traits using the Illumina BovineSNPs50 BeadChip.The results showed that 1 700 SNPs was significantly associated with AFC at genome-wide level.Preliminarily,43 significant SNPs with P-valves smaller than 10-15 were chosen to do the bioinformatics analyses.Among the 43 SNPs,12 were located on X chromosome,while some were within 1 Mb(20.42-21.52 Mb)on SSC7.In particular,the candidate genes of KLHL4,TRAM1,TRAM2,ZNF438 and MATK were related to some reproductive disturbances or diseases.The current study explored some novel SNPs as well as potential candidate genes associated with heifer calving traits,which can be used to unravel the genetic foundation of fertility traits in dairy cattle.

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