GeneNovaS

GeneNovaS, developed by Dr. Hossain Farid at the Faculty of Agriculture and Gregory Bishop, formerly a professor with the Department of Engineering at the NSAC, is a project aimed at assisting Canadian sheep breeders in the use of molecular markers to accelerate the genetic improvement of their livestock for resistance to the ovine spongiform encephalopathy (scrapie).

GeneNovaS contains the national database with a web-interface to manage the genotypes of Canadian purebred sheep at the prion protein gene, which is associated with scrapie resistance. It was designed to help Canadian sheep breeders establishing scrapie resistant flocks with the least cost by predicting the genotypes of individual sheep when possible, such as the progeny of homozygous parents. GeneNovaS also provide a marketplace where registered breeders could list their genotyped sheep offered for sale.

The first of its kind, GeneNovaS provide a user-friendly interface between genotype information and sheep breeders. The website has a demonstration mode where the program capabilities can be viewed and tested.

Contact

Dr. A. Hossain Farid
Professor, Animal Breeding and Genetics
Department of Animal Science
Faculty of Agriculture, Dalhousie University
ah.farid@dal.ca
Phone: (902) 893-6727
Fax: (902) 895-6734