Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-l7hp2 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-24T12:02:48.988Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

A note on non-random mating in progeny tests

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 April 2009

E. C. R. Reeve
Affiliation:
Agricultural Research Council Unit of Animal Genetics, Institute of Animal Genetics, Edinburgh 9
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

The regression of progeny on mid-parent value is often used in progeny tests to estimate the heritability of a quantitative character. The statistical precision of such an estimate can be considerably increased without increasing the size of the test, by using assortative mating or selection of parents (or both together) so as to increase the mid-parent variance; but the danger arises that this may introduce bias into the estimate through correlation between non-additive gene effects.

It is shown by a mathematical argument that such bias will be negligible provided that all individual gene substitution effects are small compared with the phenotypic standard deviation of the character. Under this condition, deviations from additive effects either within or between loci will not appreciably affect the expected value of the regression on mid-parent, compared with its expected value in a test using random mating.

Correlation between the non-additive gene effects is likely to cause more serious bias to the correlation between sibs, when non-random mating is used.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1961

References

REFERENCES

Falconer, D. S. (1960). Introduction to Quantitative Genetics. Oliver & Boyd, Edinburgh and London.Google Scholar
Fisher, R. A. (1918). The correlation between relatives on the supposition of Mendelian inheritance. Trans. roy. Soc. Edinb. lii, 399433.Google Scholar
Kempthorne, Oscar (1957). An Introduction to Genetic Statistics. John Wiley & Sons Inc., New York.Google Scholar
Reeve, E. C. R. (1953). Studies in quantitative inheritance. III: Heritability and genetic correlation in progeny tests using different mating systems. J. Genet. 51, 520542.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Reeve, E. C. R. (1955). Contribution to discussion in Cold Spr. Harb. Symp. quant. Biol., 20, 7678.Google Scholar
Wright, S. (1952). The genetics of quantitative variability. In Quantitative Inheritance, eds. Reeve, E. C. R. & Waddington, C. H., pp. 541. Her Majesty's Stationery Office, London.Google Scholar