A genome-wide association study and an accurate genotyping strategy to identify and validate the SNPs related to the larval period in bullfrog Aquarana catesbeiana.

Metamorphosis is the vital biological and morphologic process in economic amphibian bullfrog Aquarana catesbeiana, and is usually quantified by larval period in actual seeding production. As a key growth trait, the short larval period in bullfrogs is profitable for commercial aquaculture and trade, but lack of research on the perspective of genetic breeding. In our study, we identified 37 candidate SNPs related to the larval period using genome-wide association studies (GWAS) from the results of restriction-site associated DNA sequencing (RAD-seq) in 40 individuals (containing 20 juvenile frogs and 20 tadpoles), and genotyped SNPs above in 576 individuals with different phenotypes of larval period accurately using genotyping-in-thousands by sequencing technology (GT-seq), and finally validated nine SNPs (containing five loci with strictly higher level confidence) significantly associated with larval period. More importantly, these data suggest that the genes surrounding nine candidate SNPs could be involved in the biological processes associated with tissue-specific occurrences of cell proliferation, cell death, and changes in cell differentiation during metamorphosis. This study fills a research gap in the larval period of bullfrog breeding work and lays a preliminary foundation for further selective breeding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]