Genetic analysis of inherited coat color and morphological traits in Swiss goat breeds

We sequenced the whole genomes of animals from different Swiss goat breeds to study the molecular etiology of Mendelian traits. For the presence of congenital appendages (wattles) on the throat of goats we found an association with the FMN1/GREM1 region on chromosome 10. Furthermore we identified that the brown coat color of Coppernecked goats is associated with a non-synonymous variant at the TYRP1 locus on chromosome 8. The breed specific depigmentation phenotype of Boer goats was shown to be associated with a 1 Mb duplication on chromosome 17 containing a missense variant in the EDNRA gene. Studying morphological and coat color traits in goats implicates that the identified associated genes play an important role during development. The recent development of a goat genome reference sequence shows that domestic goats with breed specific traits have a so far underestimated potential as large animal model and to assign new gene functions.