Genetic relationships of cattle breeds assessed by PCR-RFLP of the bovine mitochondrial DNA D-loop region

To investigate the genetic relationships among various cattle breeds, bovine mtDNA D-loop region was used in 411 animals of 18 cattle breeds, including 8 Asian Bos taurus, 7 European Bos taurus, 1 Asian Bos indicus, and 2 African Bos indicus. The size of amplified PCR products from mtDNA D-loop region was 964 bp and the products were digested by 15 different restriction enzymes. Two different band patterns were identified in eight restriction enzymes (BstXI, Hae III, Msp I, Apa I, Tag I, Alu I, BamH I, EcoN I) and the rest of restriction enzymes showed more than 3 different band patterns among which Apo I and MspR9 resulted in 7 different restriction patterns. The genotypes, number of haplotype, effective number of haplotype, and degree of heterozygosity were analyzed. Based on all the PCR-RFLP data, different haplotypes were constructed and analyzed for calculating genetic distances between these breeds using Nei's unbiased method and constructing a phylogenetic tree.