A genome-wide association study for racing performances in Thoroughbreds clarifies a candidate region near the MSTN gene.
Using 1400 microsatellites, a genome-wide association study (GWAS) was performed to identify genomic regions associated with lifetime earnings and performance ranks, as determined by the Japan Racing Association (JRA). The minimum heritability (h(2) ) was estimated at 7-8% based on the quantitative trait model, suggesting that the racing performance is heritable. Following GWAS with microsatellites, fine mapping led to identification of three SNPs on ECA18, namely, g.65809482T>C (P=1.05E-18), g.65868604G>T (P=6.47E-17), and g.66539967A>G (P=3.35E-14) associated with these performance measures. The haplotype of these SNPs, together with a recently published nearby SNP, g.66493737C>T (P=9.06E-16) in strong linkage disequilibrium, also showed a very clear association with the performance (P<1E-05). The candidate genomic region contained eight genes annotated by ENSEMBL, including the myostatin gene (MSTN). These findings suggest the presence of a gene affecting the racing performance in Thoroughbred racehorses in this region on ECA18.
Department of Molecular Genetics, Laboratory of Racing Chemistry, Utsunomiya, Tochigi, Japan. ttozaki@lrc.or.jp
T
T
Tozaki
T
T
Miyake
H
H
Kakoi
H
H
Gawahara
S
S
Sugita
T
T
Hasegawa
N
N
Ishida
K
K
Hirota
Y
Y
Nakano
D000818:Animals; D055106:Genome-Wide Association Study; D006736:Horses / Q000235:genetics* / Q000502:physiology; D018895:Microsatellite Repeats; D055435:Myostatin / Q000235:genetics*
D055435:Myostatin