TY - JOUR AU - Fontanesi, Luca AU - Schiavo, Giuseppina AU - Galimberti, Giuliano AU - Calò, Daniela Giovanna AU - Scotti, Emilio AU - Martelli, Pier Luigi AU - Buttazzoni, Luca AU - Casadio, Rita AU - Russo, Vincenzo PY - 2012 DA - 2012/11/15 TI - A genome wide association study for backfat thickness in Italian Large White pigs highlights new regions affecting fat deposition including neuronal genes JO - BMC Genomics SP - 583 VL - 13 IS - 1 AB - Carcass fatness is an important trait in most pig breeding programs. Following market requests, breeding plans for fresh pork consumption are usually designed to reduce carcass fat content and increase lean meat deposition. However, the Italian pig industry is mainly devoted to the production of Protected Designation of Origin dry cured hams: pigs are slaughtered at around 160 kg of live weight and the breeding goal aims at maintaining fat coverage, measured as backfat thickness to avoid excessive desiccation of the hams. This objective has shaped the genetic pool of Italian heavy pig breeds for a few decades. In this study we applied a selective genotyping approach within a population of ~ 12,000 performance tested Italian Large White pigs. Within this population, we selectively genotyped 304 pigs with extreme and divergent backfat thickness estimated breeding value by the Illumina PorcineSNP60 BeadChip and performed a genome wide association study to identify loci associated to this trait. SN - 1471-2164 UR - https://doi.org/10.1186/1471-2164-13-583 DO - 10.1186/1471-2164-13-583 ID - Fontanesi2012 ER -