Leveling the genealogical landscape in the breeding group of mini pigs

Abstract

The purpose of the research is to analyze changes in the genealogical landscape in a closed breeding group of mini pigs bred by the IC&G SB RAS over nine generations – from the 8th to the 16th. The research is based on the study of the dynamics of the "blood proportion" indicator of a large form of domestic pig in a herd of mini pigs (247 individuals). The data were processed and evaluated using a set of statistical parameters and criteria: Mann-Kendall, Conover-Iman. The article presents the results of using the abstract and, as is now widely recognized, archaic concept of "blood proportion" for the analysis of genetic and population processes. This indicator represents the expected proportion of the founder's genome or the original population form retained in the genomes of its descendants. It is an individual characteristic of an organism and can be considered a quantitative feature. As such, "blood proportion" indicators were used to analyze the process of stabilizing the genealogical landscape, reflecting the equalization of the population's gene pool – the automatic process of "mixing" the genetic material of the population founders and the leveling of individuals according to the propor-tion of this material in the genome. The term "genealogical landscape" refers to the quantitative, but not qualitative, contri-bution of the founders to the genome of the individuals making up the population. The consequence of this process is the leveling of the genealogical landscape. The founders’ “blood proportions” will continue to change over successive genera-tions as long as variation in this measure persists among individuals. In each succeeding generation, these differences will decrease until they disappear. The signs by which one can judge the end of the leveling of the genealogical landscape are the zero values of the observed ranges of variation and standard deviations, as well as the equality of the minimum, maximum and average values of the blood proportion of each ancestor. The study fully confirmed the fulfillment of all the consequences of this process in the "closed" breeding group of mini pigs bred by IC&G SB RAS and showed that this process should be over in the 17–30th generations. Thus, the results demonstrate that, despite its archaic nature, the “blood proportion” indi-cator remains a valid tool for analyzing intrapopulation processes.