Abstract
In Saudi Arabia, the sheep production systems are mainly managed under farmer production systems, so their genetic management has led to increased homozygosity and hence productivity loss. The aim of this study was to genetically characterize 47 individuals of Awassi (Naeimi) sheep breed using a panel of eighteen microsatellite markers. Blood samples were used to extract genomic DNA followed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR). Results showed that 159 alleles were generated by the 18 microsatellites loci with an average of 8.833 alleles per locus. The DYMS1 SSR marker showed the highest number of alleles per locus (14) while OarAE129 showed the lowest (3).
The expected heterozygosity (He) ranged from 0.541 to 0.860 with an average of 0.755 whereas the average observed heterozygosity (Ho) was 0.800 with a range of 0.319 to 1.000. The mean effective allele number was 4.643 which ranged from 2.177 to 7.219. Seven out of the 18 loci encountered significant departure from Hardy Weinberg Equilibrium (p < 0.05). The mean of Shannon index was 1.691 which ranged from 0.896 to 2.223. The results indicated the utility of using microsatellite loci in studying the genetic diversity in sheep populations of Saudi Arabia.