THE AIM OF THIS STUDY WAS TO INVESTIGATE THE GENETIC DIVERSITY WITHIN AND AMONG THREE BREEDS OF SHEEP: Corriedale, Merino and Creole. Sheep from the three breeds (Merino n = 110, Corriedale n = 108 and Creole n = 10) were genotyped using the Illumina Ovine SNP50 beadchip(®). Genetic diversity was evaluated by comparing the minor allele frequency (MAF) among breeds. Population structure and gene...

Genetic diversity of sub-Saharan African goats was assessed using 19 microsatellite markers. Breeds were sampled from eastern Africa (Maasai, Kigezi, Mubende, North West Highland, Arsi-Bale), southern Africa (Ndebele, Pafuri) and West Africa (West African Dwarf, Maure, Djallonke). European breeds (Grisons Striped, Toggenburg), Asian breeds (Mongolian Cashmere, Bandipur) and a Middle East breed ...

Studies about the behaviours of mixed-breed dogs are rare, although mixed-breeds represent the majority of the world's dog population. We have conducted two surveys to investigate the behavioural, demographic, and dog keeping differences between purebred and mixed-breed companion dogs. Questionnaire data were collected on a large sample of dogs living in Germany (N = 7,700 purebred dogs represe...

Genetic variability and relationships among six native French cattle breeds (Abondance, Tarentaise, Villard de Lans, Montbéliarde, Limousin, and Charolais) and one foreign breed (Holstein) were investigated using 23 microsatellite markers. These breeds were also compared with four Swiss breeds genotyped in a previously published study. Interestingly, the French alpine breeds have smaller popula...

In the present study, we evaluated the informativeness of SNPs genotyped by the Illumina Bovine SNP50K assay in different cattle breeds. To investigate these on a genome-wide scale, we considered 52,678 SNPs spanning the whole autosomal and X chromosomes in cattle. Our study samples consists of six different cattle breeds. Across the breeds approximately 72 and 6% SNPs were found polymorphic an...

BACKGROUND Knowledge of linkage disequilibrium (LD) levels among different populations can be used to detect genetic diversity and to investigate the historical changes in population sizes. Availability of large numbers of SNP through new sequencing technologies has provided opportunities for extensive researches in quantifying LD patterns in cattle breeds. The aim of this study was to compare ...

Locally adapted breeds of livestock are of considerable interest since they represent potential reservoirs of adaptive fitness traits that may contribute to the future of sustainable productivity in a changing climate. Recent research, involving three hill sheep breeds geographically concentrated in the northern uplands of the UK has revealed the extent of their genetic diversity from one anoth...

Understanding existing levels of genetic diversity of sheep breeds facilitates in situ and ex situ conservation activities. A comprehensive evaluation of US sheep breeds has not been previously performed; therefore, we evaluated the genetic diversity among and within 28 US sheep breeds. Both major and minor breeds were included in the analysis and consisted of 666 animals from 222 producers loc...

Uganda has a large population of goats, predominantly from indigenous breeds reared in diverse production systems, whose existence is threatened by crossbreeding with exotic Boer goats. Knowledge about the genetic characteristics and relationships among these Ugandan goat breeds and the potential admixture with Boer goats is still limited. Using a medium-density single nucleotide polymorphism (...