Author(s)

Hideki Tanomura, Youji Muramatsu, Takuji Yamamoto, Takeshi Ohta, Hiroyuki Kose, Takahisa Yamada

Central Pharmaceutical Research Institute, Japan Tobacco, Inc., Takatsuki, Japan.
Department of Life Science, Division of Natural Sciences, International Christian University, Mitaka, Japan.
Department of Nutritional Sciences for Well-being, Faculty of Health Sciences for Welfare, Kansai University of Welfare Sciences, Kashiwara, Japan.
Laboratory of Animal Genetics, Graduate School of Science and Technology, Niigata University, Nishi-ku, Japan.

Marbling is regarded as an economically important trait of beef cattle inJapan, and measured as a beef marbling score (BMS). Our previous study reported an association between a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP), rs4164 8172, in the pancreatic lipase (PNLIP) gene and the BMS level, using the Japanese Black beef cattle population of Oita prefecture. Further, we showed that the T allele at the rs41648172 SNP is associated with a high level of the BMS. Thus, we suggested that the rs41648172 SNP seems to be a candidate marker for marker-assisted selection. Our present study was designed to investigate whether this association could be replicated in other independent Japanese Black cattle population and analyze the effect of the SNP genotypes on the carcass traits other than the BMS. We detected the marginally significant effect of the genotypes of the rs41648172 SNP on the BMS level by using the Japanese Black beef cattle population of Niigata prefecture (P = 0.0919), and obtained the result of the T allele associated with an increase in the BMS level, consistent with our previous data. In addition, we showed no significant association of the SNP with the subcutaneous fat thickness, carcass weight, rib eye area, rib thickness and yield estimate in the Japanese Black beef cattle population ofNiigataprefecture. Thus, we concluded that the rs41648172 SNP was useful for effective marker-assisted selection to increase the BMS level in Japanese Black beef cattle, based on the replicated association of the rs41648172 SNP with the BMS level in the other independent Japanese Black beef cattle population and no effect of the SNP genotypes on the carcass traits other than BMS.

Association; PNLIP; Japanese Black Breed; Marbling; Replication Study; Single Nucleotide Polymorphism

Tanomura, H. , Muramatsu, Y. , Yamamoto, T. , Ohta, T. , Kose, H. and Yamada, T. (2013) Replicated association of the single nucleotide polymorphism in PNLIP with marbling in Niigata population of Japanese Black beef cattle. Open Journal of Animal Sciences, 3, 89-92. doi: 10.4236/ojas.2013.32013.