Genetic diversity, population structure and phylogenetic relationship of race, sports, draft and wild type horses

Abstract

In the current study, data of 930 horses was used and divided into four types of categories i.e. Draft, Wild, Sports and Race types. A set of ten microsatellite markers HTG10, ASB2, ASB17, HMS3, AHT4, HMS7, VHL20, AHT05, HTG4, and HMS6 were studied. Allelic frequency, total number of alleles, observed number of alleles, expected number of alleles, heterozygosity, Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium was calculated using GeneAIEX 6.502 software. Genetic structure of horse breeds was studied using STRUCTURE & STRUCTURE harvest software, while results were visualized by CLUMP and DISTRUCT software. Moreover, Phylogenetic analysis was performed using PHYLIP and data was visualized in MEGA 7. Maximum number of alleles was observed for sports category, and most polymorphic markers among all types of horses was ASB17. The maximum and minimum values of inbreeding coefficient was found in wild and race horses respectively. Maximum observed heterozygosity was found in case of race horses; however, highest value of expected heterozygosity was found for sports horses. Present study showed that even with limited number of markers considerable level of genetic diversity between and among all types of horses was observed.