Genome-wide association study for feed efficiency in collective cage-raised rabbits under full and restricted feeding

Feed efficiency (FE) is one of the most economically and environmentally relevant traits in the animal production sector. The objective of this study was to gain knowledge about the genetic control of FE in rabbits. To this end, GWASs were conducted for individual growth under two feeding regimes (f...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores: Sánchez, Juan Pablo|||0000-0001-8639-6146, Legarra, Andres, Velasco-Galilea, M., Piles, Miriam|||0000-0001-8265-9930, Sánchez Bonastre, Armando|||0000-0001-9160-1124, Rafel Guarro, Oriol, González-Rodríguez, Olga, Ballester Devis, Maria|||0000-0002-5413-4640
Tipo de recurso: artículo
Fecha de publicación:2020
País:España
Institución:Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
Repositorio:Dipòsit Digital de Documents de la UAB
Idioma:inglés
OAI Identifier:oai:ddd.uab.cat:236999
Acceso en línea:https://ddd.uab.cat/record/236999
https://dx.doi.org/urn:doi:10.1111/age.12988
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palabra clave:Candidate gene
Feed efficiency
Genome-wide association study
Growth
Pooled records
Rabbit
Restricted feeding
Descripción
Sumario:Feed efficiency (FE) is one of the most economically and environmentally relevant traits in the animal production sector. The objective of this study was to gain knowledge about the genetic control of FE in rabbits. To this end, GWASs were conducted for individual growth under two feeding regimes (full feeding and restricted) and FE traits collected from cage groups, using 114 604 autosome SNPs segregating in 438 rabbits. Two different models were implemented: (1) an animal model with a linear regression on each SNP allele for growth trait; and (2) a two-trait animal model, jointly fitting the performance trait and each SNP allele content, for FE traits. This last modeling strategy is a new tool applied to GWAS and allows information to be considered from non-genotyped individuals whose contribution is relevant in the group average traits. A total of 189 SNPs in 17 chromosomal regions were declared to be significantly associated with any of the five analyzed traits at a chromosome-wide level. In 12 of these regions, 20 candidate genes were proposed to explain the variation of the analyzed traits, including genes such as FTO, NDUFAF6 and CEBPA previously associated with growth and FE traits in monogastric species. Candidate genes associated with behavioral patterns were also identified. Overall, our results can be considered as the foundation for future functional research to unravel the actual causal mutations regulating growth and FE in rabbits.