Yancovich, A., Lab. of Animal Breeding and Genetics, Hebrew University, Faculty of Agriculture, PO Box 12, Rehovot 76100, Israel
Levin, I., Department of Genetics, Institute of Field and Garden Crops, Agricultural Research Organization, PO Box 6, Bet Dagan 50250, Israel
Cahaner, A., Lab. of Animal Breeding and Genetics, Hebrew University, Faculty of Agriculture, PO Box 12, Rehovot 76100, Israel
Hillel, J., Lab. of Animal Breeding and Genetics, Hebrew University, Faculty of Agriculture, PO Box 12, Rehovot 76100, Israel
Levin, I., Department of Genetics, Institute of Field and Garden Crops, Agricultural Research Organization, PO Box 6, Bet Dagan 50250, Israel
Cahaner, A., Lab. of Animal Breeding and Genetics, Hebrew University, Faculty of Agriculture, PO Box 12, Rehovot 76100, Israel
Hillel, J., Lab. of Animal Breeding and Genetics, Hebrew University, Faculty of Agriculture, PO Box 12, Rehovot 76100, Israel
Theoretical predictions suggest that DNA markers can be useful tools for genomic selection in gene introgression programmes. An experiment was carried out to evaluate the efficiency of using multi-locus DNA markers in an introgression programme designed to transfer the naked neck gene from a donor to a recipient chicken line. The donor line was a commercial egg layer chicken stock heterozygous at the naked neck locus (Na/na+), while the recipients were from a Cornish broiler line. These two lines differ markedly in their average body weight, a quantitative trait that can also represent the comprehensive differences between the genomes of the two lines involved. Three groups of naked neck BC1 individuals were selected according to the following criteria: (i) low band-sharing with their donor grandsires evaluated by multi-locus DNA markers, (ii) high body weight at six weeks of age, and (iii) selection at random as a control group. Birds from each of these groups were mated at random to individuals from the heavier Cornish line to produce three groups of BC2 individuals whose body weights were recorded weekly from three to seven weeks of age. Results indicated that BC2 birds obtained from BC1 parents selected for band-sharing levels and those selected for body weight, performed equally well at 4-7 weeks of age; both were 3.1-3.9% heavier than birds from the randomly selected group. The additional genome recovery of the heavier broiler line, obtained by DNA markers, was found to be in agreement with theoretically predicted values.
