Genome‐wide association study for body weight in cattle populations from Siberia

Summary Body weight is a complex trait in cattle associated with commonly used commercial breeding measurements related to growth. Although many quantitative trait loci ( QTL ) for body weight have been identified in cattle so far, searching for genetic determinants in different breeds or environments is promising. Therefore, we carried out a genome‐wide association study ( GWAS ) in two cattle populations from the Russian Federation (Siberian region) using the GGP HD 150K array containing 139 376 single nucleotide polymorphism ( SNP ) markers. Association tests for 107 550 SNP s left after filtering revealed five statistically significant SNP s on BTA 5, considering a false discovery rate of less than 0.05. The chromosomal region containing these five SNP s contains the CCND 2 gene, which was previously associated with average daily weight gain and body mass index in US beef cattle populations and in humans respectively. Our study is the first GWAS for body weight in beef cattle populations from the Russian Federation. The results provided here suggest that, despite the existence of breed‐ and species‐specific QTL , the genetic architecture of body weight could be evolutionarily conserved in mammals.