Capturing goats: documenting two hundred years of mitochondrial DNA diversity among goat populations from Britain and Ireland.

ABSTRACT: The domestic goat (Capra hircus) plays a key role in global agriculture, being especially prized in regions of marginal pasture. However, the advent of industrialized breeding has seen a dramatic reduction in genetic diversity within commercial populations, while high extinction rates among feral herds have further depleted the reservoir of genetic variation available. Here, we present the first survey of whole mitochondrial genomic variation among the modern and historical goat populations of Britain and Ireland using a combination of mtDNA enrichment and high throughput sequencing. Fifteen historical taxidermy samples, representing the indigenous 'Old Goat' populations of the islands, were sequenced alongside five modern Irish dairy goats and four feral samples from endangered pop

SUBMITTER: Cassidy LM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5377032 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature