Genome-wide association study for age at puberty in young Nelore bulls.
Selection for bulls that would reach puberty early reduces the generation interval and increases fertility and herd productivity. Despite its economic importance, there are few QTL associated with age at puberty described in the literature. In this study, a weighted single-step genome-wide association study was performed to detect genomic regions and putative candidate genes related to age at puberty in young Nelore bulls. Several protein-coding genes related to spermatogenesis functions were identified within the genomic regions that explain more than 0.5% of the additive genetic variance for age at puberty in Nelore bulls, such as ADAM11, BRCA1, CSNK2A, CREBBP, MEIOC, NDRG2, NECTIN3, PARP2, PARP9, PRSS21, RAD51C, RNASE4, SLX4, SPA17, TEX14, TIMP2 and TRIP13 gene. Enrichment analysis by DAVID also revealed several GO terms related to spermatogenesis such as DNA replication (GO:0006260), male meiosis I (GO:0007141), double-strand break repair (GO:0006302), base excision repair (GO:0006284), apoptotic process (GO:0006915), cell-cell adhesion (GO: 0098609) and focal adhesion (GO:0005925). The heritability for age at puberty shows that this trait can be improved based on traditional EBV selection. Adding genomic information to the system helps to elucidate genes and molecular mechanisms controlling the sexual precocity and could help to predict sexual precocity in Nelore bulls with greater accuracy at younger age, which would speed up the breeding programme for this breed.
['Stafuzza|Nedenia Bonvino|NB|https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6432-2330', 'Costa E Silva|Eliane Vianna da|EVD|', 'Silva|Rafael Medeiros de Oliveira|RMO|', 'Costa Filho|Luiz Carlos Cesar da|LCCD|', 'Barbosa|Fernanda Battistotti|FB|', 'Macedo|Gustavo Guerino|GG|', 'Lobo|Raysildo B|RB|', 'Baldi|Fernando|F|']
D000818:Animals D001947:Breeding D002417:Cattle D002874:Chromosome Mapping D014644:Genetic Variation D055106:Genome-Wide Association Study D023281:Genomics D005838:Genotype D008297:Male D020412:Multifactorial Inheritance D010641:Phenotype D020641:Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide D040641:Quantitative Trait Loci D012098:Reproduction D012741:Sexual Maturation
sexual precocity Bos indicus GWAS beef cattle