AUTHOR=Cheng Jie , Cao Xiukai , Hanif Quratulain , Pi Li , Hu Linyong , Huang Yongzhen , Lan Xianyong , Lei Chuzhao , Chen Hong 

TITLE=Integrating Genome-Wide CNVs Into QTLs and High Confidence GWAScore Regions Identified Positional Candidates for Sheep Economic Traits

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Genetics

VOLUME=11

YEAR=2020

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/genetics/articles/10.3389/fgene.2020.00569

DOI=10.3389/fgene.2020.00569

ISSN=1664-8021

ABSTRACT=<p>Copy number variations (CNVs) are important source of genetic variation, which can affect diverse economic traits through a variety of mechanisms. In addition, genome scan can identify many quantitative trait loci (QTLs) for the economic traits, while genome-wide association studies (GWAS) can localize genetic variants associated with the phenotypic variations. Here, we developed a method called GWAScore which collected GWAS summary data to identify potential candidates, and integrated CNVs into QTLs and high confidence GWAScore regions to detect crucial CNV markers for sheep growth traits. We got 197 candidate genes which were overlapping with the candidate CNVs. Some crucial genes (<italic>MYLK3</italic>, <italic>TTC29</italic>, <italic>HERC6</italic>, <italic>ABCG2</italic>, <italic>RUNX1</italic>, etc.) showed significantly elevated GWAScore peaks than other candidate genes. In this study, we developed the GWAScore method to excavate the potential value of candidate genes as markers for the sheep molecular breeding.</p>