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Mitochondrial diversity and the origin of Iberian sheep

Genetics Selection Evolution volume 39, Article number: 91 (2007) Cite this article

Abstract

Mitochondrial DNA diversity was analysed in 19 Iberian and six foreign sheep breeds. Three mtDNA lineages (B, A and C) were found in the Iberian sheep, with type B clearly predominating over the others. The results were analysed for each of the morphologically determined breed groups in Iberian sheep: Merino, Entrefino, Churro and Iberian trunks. MtDNA lineage C was found only in the Iberian trunk composed of Montesina and Ojalada. These two populations had high mtDNA variability, and in the Iberian sheep only Merino Branco had more variation. The other three Merino types studied showed moderate variability, including the most authentic Merino, the Spanish Merino. These three Merinos clustered closely in a multidimensional scaling representation of distances, while the fourth breed (Merino Branco) showed a clear separation. As for the other two trunks, breeds from the Churro group showed greater maternal uniformity while results for populations included in the so-called Entrefino trunk seemed to have a more heterogeneous maternal origin. The results obtained are discussed with available data from nuclear markers and with morphological classifications, and all this information is analysed in relation to the origin of the different Iberian sheep breeds.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Departamento de Producción Animal, Universidad de León, 24071, León, Spain

    Susana Pedrosa, Juan-José Arranz, Fermín San Primitivo & Yolanda Bayón

  2. Departamento de Ciências e Recursos Animais, Escola Superior Agrária, Istituto Politecnico Viana do Castelo, Ponte de Lima, Portugal

    Nuno Brito

  3. Departamento de Genética, Facultad de Veterinaria, Universidad de Córdoba, Spain

    Antonio Molina

Authors
  1. Susana Pedrosa
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  2. Juan-José Arranz
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  3. Nuno Brito
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  4. Antonio Molina
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  5. Fermín San Primitivo
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  6. Yolanda Bayón
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Yolanda Bayón.

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Open Access This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License ( https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 ), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

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Pedrosa, S., Arranz, JJ., Brito, N. et al. Mitochondrial diversity and the origin of Iberian sheep. Genet Sel Evol 39, 91 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1186/1297-9686-39-1-91

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1186/1297-9686-39-1-91

Keywords

Genetics Selection Evolution

ISSN: 1297-9686