A Steak in Genomics™

From PLOS Genetics doi:10.1371/journal.pgen.1004254.g005 Story Contact : Nathan Hurst,   hurstn@missouri.edu , 573-882-6217 COLUMBIA, Mo. – Geneticist and anthropologists previously suspected that ancient Africans domesticated cattle native to the African continent nearly 10,000 years ago. Now, a team of University of Missouri researchers has completed the genetic history of 134 cattle breeds from around the world. In the process of completing this history, they found that ancient domesticated African cattle originated in the “ Fertile Crescent ,” a region that covered modern day Iraq, Jordan, Syria and Israel. Lead researcher Jared Decker , an assistant professor of animal science in the MU College of Agriculture, Food and Natural Resources, says the genetics of these African cattle breeds are similar to those of cattle first domesticated in the Middle East nearly 10,000 years ago, proving that those cattle were brought to Africa as farmers migrated south. Those cattle t...

Reporting on the  RAAA Brain Trust 2014: Genomics are building blocks for the future; seedstock producers are the architects , Sheyna Strommen discusses the recent Red Angus seminar held in Denver, Colorado. The Brain Trust is the Red Angus Association's educational forum. Bob Weaber, a professor at Kansas State and state cow-calf extension specialist, discussed how genomic technologies, such as genomic-enhanced EPDs, are now a useful tool for breeding cattle. The article by Strommen quotes Weaber: “The purpose of genomics is not to make one bull’s EPDs go up and another’s go down,” Weaber explained. “The real purpose is to enhance the EPD accuracies of the bulls and females tested.“ “If we think about collecting data in traditional genetic evaluation systems to produce EPDs, predictive power takes a lot of data and a lot of time,” Weaber acknowledged. “We have the advantage in genomic data to make selection decisions when cattle are really young.” This may allow seedstock p...