According to FAO, one third of all livestock breeds have either perished or are threatened with extinction, due to intensive selection for high production by means of artificial insemination and embryo transfer and spreading of a small number of genetically narrow high-performance breeds around the whole world.
Holstein cattle have undergone intensive selection for milk production in recent decades, which has left genome-wide footprints of domestication.
The modern commercial broiler is the product of intensive selection for rapid growth and enhanced muscle mass over many generations.
During approximately 60 generations of selection, the meat type (broiler) bird has undergone intensive selection for rapid growth and increased pectoral muscle mass [ 2, 3].
Yorkshire and Landrace may have selection footprints in their genome resulting from intensive selection for production attributes over the past few decades.
Here, we employed a medium sequencing depth (5 20x/site per individual, on average) approach called genotyping by genome reducing and sequencing (GGRS) to detect genome-wide selection signatures of two domestic pig breeds (Yorkshire and Landrace) that have been under intensive selection for traits of muscle development, growth and behavior.
Yorkshire and Landrace, two commercial breeds of pigs used worldwide, have been subject to intensive selection for particular production attributes in the last decades.
Western commercial breeds, such as Large White, Landrace, Duroc and Pietrain, have experienced intensive selection for lean pork production in the past decades.
Since the Israeli Holstein population has been under intensive selection for 50 years, its genetic pool is expected to have similar characteristics.
We demonstrate that intensive selection for growth rate in both chickens and ducks has resulted in leg morphology changes, which are likely to influence gait.
