Genomic Selection in Animal Breeding Programs

Abstract

Genomic selection can have a major impact on animal breeding programs, especially where traits that are important in the breeding objective are hard to select for otherwise. Genomic selection provides more accurate estimates for breeding value earlier in the life of breeding animals, giving more selection accuracy and allowing lower generation intervals. From sheep to dairy cattle, the rates of genetic improvement could increase from 20 to 100 % and hard-to-measure traits can be improved more effectively. Reference populations for genomic selection need to be large, with thousands of animals measured for phenotype and genotype. The smaller the effective size of the breeding population, the larger the DNA segments they potentially share and the more accurate genomic prediction will be. The relative contribution of information from relatives in the reference population will be larger if the baseline accuracy is low, but such information is limited to closely related individuals and does not last over generations.