Associations between prolactin gene polymorphism and milk production in montebeliard cows

Abstract

Prolactin (PRL) is one of the multi-purpose hormones of the pituitary gland in terms of biological actions especially milk production.  In this study associations were analyzed between polymorphisms of the prolactin gene (PRL-RsaI) and milk production traits of Montebeliard cows. PCR-RFLP method was used for identification of genotypes. Frequencies of genotypes were 0.81, 0.15 and 0.04 for A/A, A/B and B/B, respectively. The frequency of PRL A allele is 0.89. The results show AA cows yielded most milk in compared of other groups. Key words: Prolactin gene, montebeliard cows, PCR-RFLP.