ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This project would not have been possible without the help of several individuals within the dairy industry. My advisor, Dr. Stan Henderson, provided the opportunity to research this project. Dr. Henderson guided me throughout the project and assisted in obtaining these data. Dr. Henderson also assisted in compiling these data and developing the manuscript. Without the help of D...

The aim of this study was to estimate genetic parameters for longevity from Swedish crossbred sows to investigate the possibilities of selecting for this trait. Data were collected from 16 commercial piglet-producing herds, on crossbred (Landrace × Yorkshire) sows farrowing in the period 1 January 2001 to 31 December 2004. The data set with records on 10 373 sows was split into two sets accordi...

The study was conducted to analyze the genetic parameters of somatic cell score (SCS) of Holstein cows, which is an important indicator to udder health. Test-day records of somatic cell counts (SCC) of 305-day lactation design from first to fifth lactations were collected on Holsteins in Korea during 2000 to 2012. Records of animals within 18 to 42 months, 30 to 54 months, 42 to 66 months, 54 t...

Estimated breeding values of test-day (TD) and 305-day milk yield were calculated to compare ranking of animals on the basis of two information sources under an animal model. Two statistical models were used to analyze 780 first lactation (305-day) and monthly milk yield records. The first model was an individual animal model to analyze lactation milk yield with period-season of calving as fixe...

Salmonella enteritidis (SE) contamination of poultry products is of global food-safety concern. The natural resistance-associated macrophage protein 1 (NRAMP1) affects host innate immunity to intracellular bacteria because of its ability to transport divalent cations in late endosome/lysosomes. Studying the association of the NRAMP1 gene and chicken innate immune response to SE can, therefore, ...

The objectives of this experiment were to characterize longissimus muscle color, texture, and firmness for beef carcasses of diverse biological types and to determine the genetic parameters of lean color, texture, and firmness. The carcasses (n = 3,641) used in this experiment were from steers produced by mating Angus, Brahman, Braunvieh, Charolais, Chianina, Galloway, Gelbvieh, Hereford, Jerse...

This study aimed to evaluate whether the host genetic background impact the ruminal microbial communities of the progeny of sires from three different breeds under different diets. Eighty five bacterial and twenty eight methanogen phylotypes from 49 individuals of diverging sire breed (Angus, ANG; Charolais, CHA; and Hybrid, HYB), fed high energy density (HE) and low energy density (LE) diets w...

We evaluated heifers crossbred from seven breeds of sires (Hereford, Angus, Belgian Blue, Piedmontese, Brahman, Boran, and Tuli) and three breeds of dams (Angus, Hereford, and MARC III [four-breed composite]). Heifers were mated to Red Poll sires to calve at 2 yr of age. Heifers were placed in two treatments from weaning to breeding and raised on a high nutrition level (15.8 Mcal ME/d) or on 80...

Blood selenium concentration at birth and growth from birth through finishing were analyzed on progeny from two birth years of Angus bulls of United States (US) or New Zealand (NZ) origin. Dams of the calves were Polled Hereford x Angus crossbreds whose sires had been selected divergently from the national sire summary to be superior (+) or inferior (-) for yearling weight EPD (G) and for total...