Salvatore Mastrangelo

TL;DR: Recent inbreeding was observed in local breeds, considering that 16 Mb segments are expected to present inbreeding up to three generations ago, and the necessity of implementing conservation programs to control the rise of inbreeding and coancestry in the three Italian local dairy cattle breeds was shown.

TL;DR: The results suggest that natural selection has, at least partially, a role in shaping the genome of Valle del Belice sheep and that ROH in the ovine genome may help to detect genomic regions involved in the determinism of traits under selection.

TL;DR: The results of the present study highlight that ancient and recent inbreeding have had an impact on the genome of the Italian sheep breeds and suggest that several animals have experienced recent autozygosity events.

TL;DR: The Bayesian assignment test showed that BAR and SAR breeds had a more definite genetic structure, whereas the lowest assignment value was found in the PIN breed, and results indicated high genetic variability, low inbreeding and low genetic differentiation, except for BAR breed, in accordance with geographical location, history, and breeding practices.

TL;DR: This study is the first exhaustive genome-wide analysis of the diversity of Italian cattle breeds using a medium-density single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) array and the results will help design and implement conservation strategies.