A team of scientists led by CSIRO’s Dr Kishore Prayaga was last night awarded a prestigious Australian Museum Eureka Prize for its work to develop a simple genetic test which has the potential to end the need to dehorn cattle. And in doing so the breakthrough has the potential to also avoid future clashes between the beef industry and animal rights activists.
While horn removal is a routine practice carried out by beef producers to reduce the incidence of cattle injuring other cattle and their handlers, there is a fear within the industry that the practice could one day provoke animal rights activists into campaigning against beef in the same way they have campaigned against the wool industry's practice of mulesing.
Notably the $10,000 Eureka Prize for Scientific Research that Contributes to Animal Protection was sponsored by animal rights group Voiceless.
About half of Australia’s 21 million beef cattle are born with horns, but dehorning causes short term pain and stress for the animal, is labour-intensive and time-consuming for producers, and can reduce animal weight gain for several weeks following the procedure.
The team, which is funded by the Beef CRC and Meat and Livestock Australia (MLA) and involves scientists from CSIRO and Queensland Primary Industry and Fisheries (QPIF), has been researching alternatives to current dehorning practices. "We have discovered a DNA marker in Bos indicius (tropically adapted cattle e.g. Brahman) which identifies the cattle that will produce polled or naturally hornless offspring," Dr Prayaga said. "Our aim is to commercialise this work into a simple test, so that cattle producers in the extensive, rangeland conditions in Northern Australia will be able for the first time to increase the proportion of polled cattle in their herd."
While there are a number of naturally “polled”, or hornless bulls within the existing cattle population, selective breeding to eliminate horns would have taken decades. This new test is expected to strip years off this projected timescale. The proposed genetic test has now been validated twice in research.
"This breakthrough has the potential to alleviate and even eliminate the pain associated with the dehorning of millions of cattle every year," Frank Howarth, director of the Australian Museum, said. "It will revolutionise the breeding of Brahman cattle."
The team has also been working on effective pain reduction and alleviation strategies for producers to use in the meantime. According to QPIF’s Dr Carol Petherick short term strategies are needed because genetics can’t solve the problem overnight. "We have experimented with local anaesthetics and analgesics, and different animal management strategies to reduce and alleviate pain," Dr Petherick said. "Experiments are continuing to find the most effective short term solutions while producers focus on breeding entirely polled herds in the future."
The team found that the pain relief used in sheep mulesing, a topical anaesthetic and antiseptic solution, is the most promising for dehorning. In June, they began a follow-up study to see if these practices will reduce the pain, stress and blood loss associated with dehorning Brahman weaner bulls. The study will also test the effectiveness of wound cauterisation.
The winning team also includes Dr Max Mariasegaram, Post-Doctoral Fellow and PhD student Stephanie Sinclair from CSIRO.
Showing posts with label molecular markers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label molecular markers. Show all posts
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Radical New Genetic Pathways to Change Livestock Breeding
It seems as if Australian science has delivered another major advance in agriculture, this time in the methodology of livestock breeding. It could have very important ramifications for almost all livestock groups, but especially cattle. Now a driver in dairy cow improvement, it is coming to beef production soon.
And so far, once again, other parts of the world have been quick to implement it's use.........with Australia lagging behind.............AGAIN!
-------------------
Genetic breakthrough to change livestock breeding
18/06/2009
WHEN Mike Goddard reflects on the path that led him into livestock genetics the response takes time.
"It seemed like a fun topic."
It is an incongruous reply for a Melbourne born and bred man who has dedicated himself over the best part of 40 odd years to improving methods for genetic selection, but one Professor Goddard has never seen as a disadvantage.
But taking Professor Goddard's modesty aside (when asked his reaction to a recent honourary doctorate awarded by the Norwegian University of Life Science he said "it was nice") Australia's and the world's advancement in livestock genetics has been a slow and often lonely road.
"We have been trying to use genetic markers since about 1990 but it is only in recent years that it has started to take off," he said. "The technology was never quite been good enough and in fact a lot of people gave up."
So where are we at now, and just what role does Australia play?
Questions Professor Goddard takes great pride in answering.
In terms of the future, he says genetics is about to take off - the technology is working and the world's need to produce more food from less has governments seeking solutions.
The dairy industry in the United States has started using a new Single Nucleotide Polymorphism (SNP) chip that can test 50,000 gene markers at once, and New Zealand, Holland and Australia are following closely. "This means instead of having to wait five years while a bull's progeny are tested, producers can test for DNA markers when the bull is born, and when the bull is a year old and semen available it can be used."
With this science, Professor Goddard said there is the potential to double the rate of genetic gain.
As far as Australia's role in genetic advancement, considering its size "we have been at the forefront in livestock all along".
"If you were to nominate one scientific area where Australia contributes more to world knowledge than expected from its population size, it would be in genetic improvement of livestock," he said.
In 2001 Professor Goddard and his colleague Ben Hayes authored a paper that showed how to predict the total genetic value of an animal using genome-wide dense DNA markers. This work, the Meuwissen, Hayes and Goddard paper, widely revered in genetic communities as breakthrough science, has since become proven thanks to the commercial release of a SNP chip for cattle in 2004.
The ability to track tens of thousands of genes in the one test, as predicted by Professor Goddard and his colleagues, has opened the flood gates on the potential for rapid genetic gain, and word travelled quickly. In the world's leading genetic early adoption country, the United States, 4500 progeny-tested dairy bulls have been tested and thousands more are scheduled. In Australia where Professor Goddard admits it has been an "unfortunately slower" around 2000 dairy bulls have been tested.
For beef and sheep, DNA testing is not a new concept, but Professor Goddard says we can't yet predict genetic merit in beef and sheep as accurately as in dairy cattle. "In dairy there is not the multiple breed problems - if it works in Holstein that is three quarters of the job done."
What Professor Goddard and his colleagues are aiming for is a commercial arrangement with a DNA company such as Pfizer, but to retain a centralised common estimated breeding value database from which producers can benchmark stock.
"For years it has been relatively easy to find the gene for traits that are controlled by a single gene such red coat color, but many traits are controlled by lots of genes which each have a small effect so the advantage with the SNP chip is that we can test up to 50,000 markers all at once."
Beef will be next to follow the dairy lead, and sheep after that, he says.
Professor Goddard, a former tropical livestock genetics expert at James Cook University Townsville, has acquired an international reputation for his broad grasp on livestock genetics.
His passport wears the mismatched marks of a seasoned traveller who is regularly fronting international genetics conventions, and in Australia his unique skill set has him stretched across duties within the Melbourne University, Department of Primary Industries and Beef CRC - as a start.
His professional career has coincided with the livestock genetics movement.
It began as a young veterinary graduate, in the 1970s, when he completed his PhD on a breeding program for guide dogs for the blind at University of Melbourne. It was working with the genetics/breeding scheme of dogs that Professor Goddard's unfaltering intrigue in genetic possibilities started. Livestock, he said, was just the next natural step.
Looking back he said it is difficult to conceptualise that a lot of the work has only just started to eventuate, but he has no doubt that genomic selection will spawn a whole new way of selecting animals.
Already he said work is being done in the beef and dairy industries on identifying genes for feed conversion traits, and in time there is the hope that producers and processors will be able to test livestock and decide for which market the animal would be best suited. "Gradually genetic selection will be introduced into all livestock sections and it will revolutionise them."
"This I have no doubt of."
extract from Queensland Country Life 18 June 2009
And so far, once again, other parts of the world have been quick to implement it's use.........with Australia lagging behind.............AGAIN!
-------------------
Genetic breakthrough to change livestock breeding
18/06/2009
WHEN Mike Goddard reflects on the path that led him into livestock genetics the response takes time.
"It seemed like a fun topic."
It is an incongruous reply for a Melbourne born and bred man who has dedicated himself over the best part of 40 odd years to improving methods for genetic selection, but one Professor Goddard has never seen as a disadvantage.
But taking Professor Goddard's modesty aside (when asked his reaction to a recent honourary doctorate awarded by the Norwegian University of Life Science he said "it was nice") Australia's and the world's advancement in livestock genetics has been a slow and often lonely road.
"We have been trying to use genetic markers since about 1990 but it is only in recent years that it has started to take off," he said. "The technology was never quite been good enough and in fact a lot of people gave up."
So where are we at now, and just what role does Australia play?
Questions Professor Goddard takes great pride in answering.
In terms of the future, he says genetics is about to take off - the technology is working and the world's need to produce more food from less has governments seeking solutions.
The dairy industry in the United States has started using a new Single Nucleotide Polymorphism (SNP) chip that can test 50,000 gene markers at once, and New Zealand, Holland and Australia are following closely. "This means instead of having to wait five years while a bull's progeny are tested, producers can test for DNA markers when the bull is born, and when the bull is a year old and semen available it can be used."
With this science, Professor Goddard said there is the potential to double the rate of genetic gain.
As far as Australia's role in genetic advancement, considering its size "we have been at the forefront in livestock all along".
"If you were to nominate one scientific area where Australia contributes more to world knowledge than expected from its population size, it would be in genetic improvement of livestock," he said.
In 2001 Professor Goddard and his colleague Ben Hayes authored a paper that showed how to predict the total genetic value of an animal using genome-wide dense DNA markers. This work, the Meuwissen, Hayes and Goddard paper, widely revered in genetic communities as breakthrough science, has since become proven thanks to the commercial release of a SNP chip for cattle in 2004.
The ability to track tens of thousands of genes in the one test, as predicted by Professor Goddard and his colleagues, has opened the flood gates on the potential for rapid genetic gain, and word travelled quickly. In the world's leading genetic early adoption country, the United States, 4500 progeny-tested dairy bulls have been tested and thousands more are scheduled. In Australia where Professor Goddard admits it has been an "unfortunately slower" around 2000 dairy bulls have been tested.
For beef and sheep, DNA testing is not a new concept, but Professor Goddard says we can't yet predict genetic merit in beef and sheep as accurately as in dairy cattle. "In dairy there is not the multiple breed problems - if it works in Holstein that is three quarters of the job done."
What Professor Goddard and his colleagues are aiming for is a commercial arrangement with a DNA company such as Pfizer, but to retain a centralised common estimated breeding value database from which producers can benchmark stock.
"For years it has been relatively easy to find the gene for traits that are controlled by a single gene such red coat color, but many traits are controlled by lots of genes which each have a small effect so the advantage with the SNP chip is that we can test up to 50,000 markers all at once."
Beef will be next to follow the dairy lead, and sheep after that, he says.
Professor Goddard, a former tropical livestock genetics expert at James Cook University Townsville, has acquired an international reputation for his broad grasp on livestock genetics.
His passport wears the mismatched marks of a seasoned traveller who is regularly fronting international genetics conventions, and in Australia his unique skill set has him stretched across duties within the Melbourne University, Department of Primary Industries and Beef CRC - as a start.
His professional career has coincided with the livestock genetics movement.
It began as a young veterinary graduate, in the 1970s, when he completed his PhD on a breeding program for guide dogs for the blind at University of Melbourne. It was working with the genetics/breeding scheme of dogs that Professor Goddard's unfaltering intrigue in genetic possibilities started. Livestock, he said, was just the next natural step.
Looking back he said it is difficult to conceptualise that a lot of the work has only just started to eventuate, but he has no doubt that genomic selection will spawn a whole new way of selecting animals.
Already he said work is being done in the beef and dairy industries on identifying genes for feed conversion traits, and in time there is the hope that producers and processors will be able to test livestock and decide for which market the animal would be best suited. "Gradually genetic selection will be introduced into all livestock sections and it will revolutionise them."
"This I have no doubt of."
extract from Queensland Country Life 18 June 2009
Wednesday, November 21, 2007
Four Potatoes Species NOT Seven
"One potato, two potato, three potato, four" turns out to be exactly right--when classifying cultivated potatoes, that is.
Scientists at the United States Agricultural Research Service (ARS) and the International Potato Center (CIP) in Peru [the country considered the centre of origin of potato species] have used morphology--the outward appearance of a plant--in combination with molecular markers to revise the number of potato species from seven to four.
Until recently, potato species designations have been based primarily on morphological characteristics and estimates--often incorrect--of how many chromosome sets they possessed.
Botanist David Spooner works in the ARS Vegetable Crops Research Unit, Madison, Wis. His initial research with CIP colleagues indicated that morphological variations [the commonly used botanical tool] among cultivated potatoes were not reliable indicators of a particular species.
They then examined DNA molecular markers from 742 cultivated potato varieties and eight wild relatives of potatoes. Based on results from this study and previous studies, Spooner and CIP lead scientist Marc Ghislain concluded that cultivated potato varieties could most accurately be assigned to one of four species - not the seven currently used.
They refined the species designations by checking each potato variety for the presence of one particular DNA mutation. This characteristic mutation distinguishes between potatoes from the Chilean lowlands and potatoes from the high Andes.
The domestic potato, Solanum tuberosum--the type eaten around most of the world--is one of the four recognized species. This is by far the most common potato species and has from two to four sets of chromosomes. The less common potato species--S. ajanhuiri, S. juzepczukii and S. curtilobum--have two, three and five sets of chromosomes, respectively. These can often be distinguished from each other by morphological data.
This new system of species classification eliminates much of the guesswork that previously served as the foundation for the potato classification system. Potato breeders will benefit greatly from a classification system that groups related collections by combining traditional morphological with modern molecular methods.
A paper reporting the results of this study was published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.
While it may not seem much, successful breeding of new varieties does rely significnantly on understanding the genetics of the material being used. It does become more complex with widely used cultivated plants, due to the enormous influence of man [and sometimes serendipity] on developing varieties over the centuries. Knowing what you are working with allows better planned breeding programs.
Scientists at the United States Agricultural Research Service (ARS) and the International Potato Center (CIP) in Peru [the country considered the centre of origin of potato species] have used morphology--the outward appearance of a plant--in combination with molecular markers to revise the number of potato species from seven to four.
Until recently, potato species designations have been based primarily on morphological characteristics and estimates--often incorrect--of how many chromosome sets they possessed.
Botanist David Spooner works in the ARS Vegetable Crops Research Unit, Madison, Wis. His initial research with CIP colleagues indicated that morphological variations [the commonly used botanical tool] among cultivated potatoes were not reliable indicators of a particular species.
They then examined DNA molecular markers from 742 cultivated potato varieties and eight wild relatives of potatoes. Based on results from this study and previous studies, Spooner and CIP lead scientist Marc Ghislain concluded that cultivated potato varieties could most accurately be assigned to one of four species - not the seven currently used.
They refined the species designations by checking each potato variety for the presence of one particular DNA mutation. This characteristic mutation distinguishes between potatoes from the Chilean lowlands and potatoes from the high Andes.
The domestic potato, Solanum tuberosum--the type eaten around most of the world--is one of the four recognized species. This is by far the most common potato species and has from two to four sets of chromosomes. The less common potato species--S. ajanhuiri, S. juzepczukii and S. curtilobum--have two, three and five sets of chromosomes, respectively. These can often be distinguished from each other by morphological data.
This new system of species classification eliminates much of the guesswork that previously served as the foundation for the potato classification system. Potato breeders will benefit greatly from a classification system that groups related collections by combining traditional morphological with modern molecular methods.
A paper reporting the results of this study was published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.
While it may not seem much, successful breeding of new varieties does rely significnantly on understanding the genetics of the material being used. It does become more complex with widely used cultivated plants, due to the enormous influence of man [and sometimes serendipity] on developing varieties over the centuries. Knowing what you are working with allows better planned breeding programs.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)