Sheep major histocompatibility (OLA) complex: linkage between a scrapie susceptibility/resistance locus and the OLA complex in Ile-de-France sheep progenies

As seen on their family trees, Ile-de-France sheep with scrapie show genetic susceptibility to this disease, which is transmitted via scr ^s, an autosomal recessive gene. Scrapie occurred in homozygous recessive sheep, whereas the presence of the dominant resistance allele Scr ^r sufficed to prevent this disease in heterozygous animals. This hypothesis, previously proposed by Parry (1962), was tested in a study involving 133 crossings of sheep of different genotypes, and verified in the observed progenies. In a contaminated environment, susceptibility to the disease seemed to be transmitted by the scr ^s gene, whose frequency was increasing and varied in different progenies: the gene was propagated by inbreeding combined with selection; scrapie did not appear in the progeny of a homozygous resistant ram with the Scr ^r/Scr^r genotype. On the family trees, linkage between the Scr locus and the OLA-A and -B loci is clearly visible; it often allowed the transmission of resistance or susceptibility haplotypes to be detected by OLA typing and followed from one generation to the next. The Scr ^r, OLA-A4, B6 haplotype was not found in any diseased sheep born before 1979, but was propagated by healthy sheep. During and after 1979, several recombinations of this haplotype were observed, giving a recombined haplotype with reciprocal linkage (scr ^s, OLA-A4, B6), disseminated by one sire in particular. The rate of recombination of Scr and OLA loci is estimated to be between 11 and 16 %. The possibility of early selection against the disease without loss of qualities desired by the breeder is discussed.