Epistatic Effects on Abdominal Fat Content in Chickens: Results from a Genome-Wide SNP-SNP Interaction Analysis

We performed a pairwise epistatic interaction test using the chicken 60 K single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) chip for the 11th generation of the Northeast Agricultural University broiler lines divergently selected for abdominal fat content. A linear mixed model was used to test two dimensions of SNP interactions affecting abdominal fat weight. With a threshold of P−11 by a Bonferroni 5% correction, 52 pairs of SNPs were detected, comprising 45 pairs showing an Additive×Additive and seven pairs showing an Additive×Dominance epistatic effect. The contribution rates of significant epistatic interactive SNPs ranged from 0.62% to 1.54%, with 47 pairs contributing more than 1%. The SNP-SNP network affecting abdominal fat weight constructed using the significant SNP pairs was analyzed, estimated and annotated. On the basis of the network’s features, SNPs Gga_rs14303341 and Gga_rs14988623 at the center of the subnet should be important nodes, and an interaction between GGAZ and GGA8 was suggested. Twenty-two quantitative trait loci, 97 genes (including nine non-coding genes), and 50 pathways were annotated on the epistatic interactive SNP-SNP network. The results of the present study provide insights into the genetic architecture underlying broiler chicken abdominal fat weight.