A MspI PCR-RFLP within bovin growth hormone gene and its association with sperm quality traits in Iranian Holstein bulls.

Abstract

+frequency for CC, CD and DD were 0.787, 0.191 and 0.022, respectively. The DD genotype was omitted of analysis. Mixed model analyses of sperm quality traits considering genotype and environment as fixed effects and animal as a random effect suggested that sire was a significant source of variation (P < 0.001) in all traits. The CC genotype resulted in a significant increase in SV (p = 0.022), FSM (p < 0.0001), TFMS (p < 0.0001), PTSM (p < 0.0001), TPTMS (p = 0.0067), TSD (p = 0.025) traits greater than CD genotype. However, CD genotype had significant effect on ATL (p = 0.0223) and ATW (p = 0.0544) traits, but not on SPCO (p = 0.3319), TS (p = 0.3818) and SC (p = 0.3841). These results indicate that new molecular markers associated with sperm quality traits can be used in marker-assisted selection in bulls.