ARS | Publication request: Predicting Breed Composition Using Breed Frequencies of 50,000 Markers from the U.S. Meat Animal Research Center 2,000 Bull Project

Submitted to: World Congress of Genetics Applied in Livestock Production
Publication Type: Proceedings
Publication Acceptance Date: May 9, 2010
Publication Date: August 1, 2010
Citation: Kuehn, L.A., Keele, J.W., Bennett, G.L., McDaneld, T.G., Smith, T.P., Snelling, W.M., Sonstegard, T.S., Thallman, R.M. 2010. Predicting Breed Composition Using Breed Frequencies of 50,000 Markers from the U.S. Meat Animal Research Center 2,000 Bull Project. Proceedings of the 9th World Congress on Genetics Applied to Livestock Production, Leipzig, Germany. August 1-6, 2010. CD-ROM Communication No. 0283.

Interpretive Summary: Our objective was to evaluate whether breed composition of crossbred cattle could be predicted using reference breed frequencies of SNP markers on the BovineSNP50 array. Semen DNA samples of over 2,000 bulls from 16 common commercial beef breeds were genotyped using the array and used to estimate current frequencies of over 50,000 SNP markers. These frequencies were subsequently used to predict breed composition of 2,014 genotyped 4-way cross animals of known breed composition. Correlation analysis between actual and predicted breed composition demonstrated that breed composition could be accurately described as long as the actual breeds were part of the frequency pool.

Technical Abstract: Our objective was to evaluate whether breed composition of crossbred cattle could be predicted using reference breed frequencies of SNP markers on the BovineSNP50 array. Semen DNA samples of over 2,000 bulls from 16 common commercial beef breeds were genotyped using the array and used to estimate current frequencies of over 50,000 SNP markers. These frequencies were subsequently used to predict breed composition of 2,014 genotyped 4-way cross animals of known breed composition. Correlation analysis between actual and predicted breed composition demonstrated that breed composition could be accurately described as long as the actual breeds were part of the frequency pool.