Genetic diversity and matrilineal genetic origin of fat-rumped sheep in Ethiopia
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Genetic diversity and matrilineal genetic origin of fat-rumped sheep in Ethiopia Helen Nigussie 1 & Joram M. Mwacharo 2 & Sarah Osama 3 & Morris Agaba 4 & Yoseph Mekasha 5 & Kefelegn Kebede 6 & Solomon Abegaz 7 & Sanjoy Kumar Pal 8 Received: 9 September 2018 / Accepted: 21 January 2019 # Springer Nature B.V. 2019
Abstract Ethiopia is home to a diverse gene pool of indigenous sheep populations. Therefore, a better understanding of genetic variation holds the key to future utilization through conservation. Three of these breeds, Afar, Blackhead Somali, and Hararghe Highland, are found in eastern Ethiopia where they contribute significantly to the livelihood of most pastoralist, agro-pastoralist, and smallholder farmers. These indigenous sheep are recognized on the basis of morphotype and their genetic distinction remains unknown. Here, to assess genetic variation, and matrilineal genetic origin and relationship of fat-rumed sheep found in eastern Ethiopia, 300 individuals from the three breeds were genotyped for 22 microsatellite markers and sequenced for the mitochondrial DNA displacement loop (mtDNA d-loop) region. The overall HO and HE were 0.57 and 0.75, respectively. Differentiation statistics revealed that a high proportion (97%) of the total genetic variation was explained by differences between individuals within populations. Genotype assignment independent of the population of origin showed K = 2 to be the optimum number of genetic backgrounds present in the dataset. This result was further confirmed by mtDNA D-loop sequences comparison in which the matrilineal genetic origin of eastern Ethiopia sheep is from two haplotype groups (types A and B) among the five haplotypes globally observed. Taken together, our findings suggest that the sheep populations from three breeds originated from two ancestral genetic backgrounds that may have diverged prior to their introduction to Ethiopia. However, to obtain a complete picture of the evolutionary dynamics of Ethiopian indigenous sheep, more samples and populations from within and outside of the country will need to be analyzed. Keywords Microsatellites . mtDNA D-loop sequence . Ovis aries
Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s11250-019-01827-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Helen Nigussie [email protected] 1
Present address: Department of Microbial, Cellular and Molecular Biology, Addis Ababa University, P.O. Box 1176, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
2
International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA) c/o ILRI, P.O. Box 5689, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
3
Biosciences eastern and central Africa (BecA-ILRI), International Livestock Research Institute, P.O. Box 30709 00100, Nairobi, Kenya
4
The Nelson Mandela African Institution of Science and Technology (NM-AIST), P.O. Box 447, Arusha, Tanzania
5
The Agricultural Transformation Agency, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
6
Institute of Agricultural Sciences in the Tropics, Department of
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