title: Detection of genetic variants affecting cattle behaviour and their impact on milk production: a genome-wide association study.
abstract: Behaviour traits of cattle have been reported to affect important production traits, such as meat quality and milk performance as well as reproduction and health. Genetic predisposition is, together with environmental stimuli, undoubtedly involved in the development of behaviour phenotypes. Underlying molecular mechanisms affecting behaviour in general and behaviour and productions traits in particular still have to be studied in detail. Therefore, we performed a genome-wide association study in an F2 Charolais × German Holstein cross-breed population to identify genetic variants that affect behaviour-related traits assessed in an open-field and novel-object test and analysed their putative impact on milk performance. Of 37,201 tested single nucleotide polymorphism (SNPs), four showed a genome-wide and 37 a chromosome-wide significant association with behaviour traits assessed in both tests. Nine of the SNPs that were associated with behaviour traits likewise showed a nominal significant association with milk performance traits. On chromosomes 14 and 29, six SNPs were identified to be associated with exploratory behaviour and inactivity during the novel-object test as well as with milk yield traits. Least squares means for behaviour and milk performance traits for these SNPs revealed that genotypes associated with higher inactivity and less exploratory behaviour promote higher milk yields. Whether these results are due to molecular mechanisms simultaneously affecting behaviour and milk performance or due to a behaviour predisposition, which causes indirect effects on milk performance by influencing individual reactivity, needs further investigation.
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Science, University of Rostock, Rostock, 18059, Germany.
authors.forename: Juliane
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Friedrich
authors.affiliation: Institute for Genome Biology, Leibniz Institute for Farm Animal Biology (FBN), Dummerstorf, 18196, Germany.
authors.forename: Bodo
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Brand
authors.affiliation: Institute for Genome Biology, Leibniz Institute for Farm Animal Biology (FBN), Dummerstorf, 18196, Germany.
authors.forename: Siriluck
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Ponsuksili
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Science, University of Rostock, Rostock, 18059, Germany.
authors.forename: Katharina L
authors.initials: KL
authors.lastname: Graunke
authors.affiliation: Institute of Behavioural Physiology, Leibniz Institute for Farm Animal Biology (FBN), Dummerstorf, 18196, Germany.
authors.forename: Jan
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Langbein
authors.affiliation: Institute for Genome Biology, Leibniz Institute for Farm Animal Biology (FBN), Dummerstorf, 18196, Germany.
authors.forename: Jacqueline
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Knaust
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Science, University of Rostock, Rostock, 18059, Germany.|Institute for Genome Biology, Leibniz Institute for Farm Animal Biology (FBN), Dummerstorf, 18196, Germany.
authors.forename: Christa
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Kühn
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Agricultural and Environmental Science, University of Rostock, Rostock, 18059, Germany.|Institute for Genome Biology, Leibniz Institute for Farm Animal Biology (FBN), Dummerstorf, 18196, Germany.
authors.forename: Manfred
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Schwerin
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001522:Behavior, Animal; D001947:Breeding; D002417:Cattle / Q000235:genetics*; D003433:Crosses, Genetic; D005260:Female; D014644:Genetic Variation; D055106:Genome-Wide Association Study / Q000662:veterinary*; D005838:Genotype; D008892:Milk; D010641:Phenotype; D020641:Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide
keywords: GWAS; behaviour genetics; milk performance; novel-object test; open-field test