Impact of microsatellite based selection on grower and layer economic traits in Rhode Island Red chicken

Abstract

Growth and egg production traits are quantitative innature with a continuum between high and low-performingbirds, and the regions of the genome that control such traitsare termed as quantitative trait loci (QTL). Microsatellitesare widely accepted as a marker of choice to detect suchQTLs, and the markers linking such QTLs can be used inmarker-assisted selection (MAS) program to introduce orpreserve beneficial QTL alleles in the population (Debnathet al. 2017). They are highly polymorphic, distributedrandomly throughout the genome displaying co-dominantinheritance (Tautz 1989) and are extensively used to studygenetic structure, variability, diversity and relationshipanalyses (Das et al. 2015). Various microsatellites have beenreported to be associated with growth and layer economictraits in chicken and its chromosome number-2 bears severalegg-weight/production-associated microsatellites alongwith other QTLs (Chatterjee et al. 2008a). Abasht et al.(2006) also reported that this chromosome also harborsgenes controlling reproduction