Better predictions for better dairy cow breeding

Scientists from Agriculture Victoria, in collaboration with the University of Melbourne, have developed a world-first customised single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) chip designed with the latest known genes that affect dairy cattle traits and therefore dairy cow breeding. The work involves the customisation of a small piece of plastic – an SNP chip – with 50,000 small dots that bind DNA to detect genetic variations on the bovine genome, with the potential to improve dairy breeding worldw