Development and Validation of a 54K Genome-Wide Liquid SNP Chip Panel by Target Sequencing for Dairy Goat

As an important genotyping platform, SNP chips are essential for implementing genomic selection. In this article, we introduced the development of a liquid SNP chip panel for dairy goats. This panel contains 54,188 SNPs based on genotyping by targeted sequencing (GBTS) technology. The source of SNPs in the panel were from the whole-genome resequencing of 110 dairy goats from three European and two Chinese indigenous dairy goat breeds. The performance of this liquid SNP chip panel was evaluated by genotyping 200 additional goats. Fifteen of them were randomly selected for whole-genome resequencing. The average capture ratio of the panel design loci was 98.41%, and the genotype concordance with resequencing reached 98.02%. We further used this chip panel to conduct genome-wide association studies (GWAS) to detect genetic loci that affect coat color in dairy goats. A single significant association signal for hair color was found on chromosome 8 at 31.52-35.02 Mb. The TYRP1 gene, which is associated with coat color in goats, was identified to be located at this genomic region (chromosome 8: 31,500,048-31,519,064). The emergence of high-precision and low-cost liquid microarrays will improve the analysis of genomics and breeding efficiency of dairy goats.