An analytical model for the estimation of chromosome substitution effects in the offspring of individuals heterozygous at a segregating marker locus

Summary Use of marker genes for quantitative traits has been suggested as a supplement to selection for livestock species. Linkage relationships can be estimated by using data from offspring of a heterozygous parent, if offspring can be positively assigned segregation of one or the other of the marker alleles. In field data, some data on offspring can be characterized and used to estimate the difference in chromosome substitution effects, but other matings result in uncertain transfer of the marker alleles. In this study, an alternative estimation procedure is proposed that would allow incorporation of data on all offspring of a heterozygous parent, even those where chromosome segregation is ambiguous. If the frequency of the marker alleles is known in the population of mates of a heterozygous individual, the mean and variance of the heterozygous offspring can be used in a generalized leastsquares model to estimate the chromosome substitution effect. When gene frequencies are not known, maximum likelihood estimates can be obtained from the data for use in a conditional estimate. Monte Carlo simulations of data following the assumed genetic model were analyzed as proposed, and parameter estimates were characterized. Estimates of chromosome substitution effects were reasonable approximations of input values. Distributions of t-statistics testing the null hypothesis of no difference between marked chromosome segments were unbiased, with only slightly larger variance than expected. Addition of data from heterozygous offspring improved the efficiency of detection of chromosome substitution effects by more than four times when marker gene frequencies were low.