Evaluating new species for aquaculture: A genomic dissection of growth in the New Zealand silver trevally (Pseudocaranx georgianus)
Aquaculture is the fastest-growing food production sector worldwide, yet industry has been slow to implement genomic techniques as routine tools. Applying genomics to new breeding programmes can provide important information about pedigree structure and genetic diversity; key parameters for a su...
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| Main Authors: | , , , , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | en |
| Published: |
John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
2025
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://umt-ir.umt.edu.my:8080/handle/123456789/21526 |
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| Summary: | Aquaculture is the fastest-growing
food production sector worldwide, yet industry
has been slow to implement genomic techniques as routine tools. Applying genomics
to new breeding programmes can provide important information about pedigree
structure and genetic diversity; key parameters for a successful long-term
breeding
programme. It can also provide insights on potential gains for commercially important,
yet complex, quantitative traits such as growth rate. Here we investigated a population
of 1100 captive-bred
F1 silver trevally (Pseudocaranx georgianus), a promising new
species for New Zealand aquaculture. We used whole-genome
information, coupled
with image-based
phenotypic data collected over two years, to build the pedigree of
the population, assess its genetic diversity, describe growth patterns of ten growth
traits and estimate their genetic parameters. Successful parentage assignment of 664
F1 individuals showed that the pedigree consisted of a complex mixture of full-and
half-sib
individuals, with skewed reproductive success among parents, especially in
females. Growth patterns showed seasonal fluctuations (average increase across all
traits of 27.3% in summer and only 7% in winter) and strong inter-family
differences.
Heritability values for growth traits ranged from 0.27 to 0.76. Genetic and phenotypic
correlations between traits were high and positive, ranging from 0.57 to 0.94 and
0.50 to 1.00 respectively. The implications of these findings are threefold: first, the
best on-growing
conditions are in warmer months, where highest growth peaks can
be achieved; second, size-and
family-based
selection can be used as early selection
criterion if pedigree structure and inbreeding risks are closely monitored; third, selection
for body length results in concomitant increases in height and weight, traits of
paramount importance for aquaculture. It is concluded that there is substantial potential
for genetic improvement of economically important traits, suggesting that silver
trevally is a promising species for selective breeding for enhanced growth. |
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