Muscular hypertrophy in beef cattle. I.Genetic bases and connected specific biological traits in cattle
2008
Gergovska, Zh.
The double muscling syndrome or muscular hypertrophy in cattle has been known for a century. The condition of these cattle involves both hyperplasia - increase in numberand hypertrophy enlargement of the muscle fibres. In 1997 it was proven that the so-called double muscling of Belgian Blue cattle is caused by a mutation of myostatin gene which caused the appearance of a premature STOP codon and thus the synthesised protein lost its biological function. Until now six different loss-of-function mutations and another four silent ones have been identified in different cattle breeds. The double muscling is associated with some production problems such as reduced fertility of male and female cattle calving difficulty and reduced calf survival poor lactation. These animals have problems associated with reduced weight of hide and liver small feet and cannon bones - slow growth susceptibility to heat stress. The superior meat and carcass characteristics are responsible for their widespread use. Because of problems in homozygous double muscled cattle a terminal sire breeding system is recommended whereby normal femaless are mated to double muscled sires and all progeny slaughtered.
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