STATUS OF THE HORSE GENOME EFFORT

M.H. Gluck Equine Research Center University of Kentucky Lexington, KY 40546-0099

Although the combustion engine has replaced the horse for the purposes of draft and transportation, the horse industry remains an important part of the American agricultural economy. Research that helps to improve the health and welfare of horses will create and maintain jobs and significantly impact the economy. Like other species, horses have hereditrary problems that include genetically adapted pathogens, allergic diseases, developmental bone diseases and muscle diseases. The problems not solved using the technologies of the 19th and 20th centuries require new approaches. Studies conducted with cattle, sheep, pigs and chickens clearly demonstrated that successful research in the 21st Century would involve the use of genomics. Therefore, the International Equine Gene Mapping Workshop (IEGMW) was formed in 1995 with the goal of making a gene map. This has truly been a group effort, involving scientists from approximately 25 laboratories, worldwide. So far, key contributions included the development of a Zoo-FISH map by scientists at the Swedish Agricultural University, a synteny map by scientists at the University of California, Davis, a half-sibling linkage map from the Swedish University of Agriculture, a half-sibling linkage map produced by the IEGMW, and development and use of BAC panels at INRA, Jouy-en-Josas, France and at Texas A&M University. These major studies were made possible by the contributions from scientists at still other institutions who developed markers, mapped genes to chromosomes and began investigations of important hereditary traits in horses. Most importantly, the collaboration allowed rapid corroboration of mapping data generated in one study with data from another. Future work will include development of another linkage map using a full sibling family and radiation hybrid panel mapping.