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Phase One
Phase Two
Humans have selected horses over thousands of years for their athletic skills. Today, horse sport competitions are designed to test the abilities of these horses and their riders and the resulting rankings are used improve the selection of the next generation of athletes. Now, genomics are the state of the art tool for selection in diverse livestock species, yet, application to the Sport Horse world has not been achieved despite recent technological advances of genomic technologies. In this two-phase study, we will analyze and quantify desirable phenotypes within a broad population of Sport Horses (jumpers, eventers and dressage) to discover genomic markers for use in genetics-based selection for desired traits in young stock, sales horses and mating decisions.
The first phase of this project is challenging: requiring extensive hands-on work with the horses and the support of horse owners and breeders.
Do you own a Sport Horse? We would love to collect samples and include your horse in our study!
For horses in the Florida area, our team of experts will come visit your horse facility and collect:
- Hair sample from mane or tail for DNA
- Pictures
- Digital videos
- Pedigree
- Health and Performance records
Not in Florida? We can adapt out sample collection kit and mail a simplified version to you.
After that, we only ask you in an annual survey to keep us up-to-date on the status of your horse. This data will help us create an individual profile for each animal.
It is very simple to enroll your horse! Just click the button below and fill out our online survey. A member of our team will contact you to schedule a visit or to confirm the mailing of our simplified sample kit. And the best part - it doesn't cost anything!
The second phase of this project is the intensive science part. We will analyze the data collected during phase one, and genotype a set of horses in a genomic association analysis for the desired traits. It is not an easy job for scientists, but at the Brooks Equine Genetics Lab we are more than qualified for this task.
Interested yet would like more information?
Please contact the Brooks Equine Genetics Lab. You can reach us by phone at (352) 273-8080 or email, equinegenetics@ifas.ufl.edu.