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Background: Accumulation of detrimental mutations in small populations leads to inbreeding depression of fitness traits and a higher frequency of genetic defects, thus increasing risk of extinction. Our objective was to quantify the magnitude of inbreeding depression for survival at birth, in a closed rabbit population under long-term selection., Methods: We used an information theory-based approach and multi-model inference to estimate inbreeding depression and its purging with respect to the trait 'kit survival at birth' over a 25-year period in a closed population of Pannon White rabbits, by analysing 22,718 kindling records. Generalised linear mixed models based on the logit link function were applied, which take polygenic random effects into account., Results: Our results indicated that inbreeding depression occurred during the period 1992-1997, based on significant estimates of the z-standardised classical inbreeding coefficient z.F L (CI 95% - 0.12 to - 0.03) and of the new inbreeding coefficient of the litter z.F NEWL (CI 95% - 0.13 to - 0.04) as well as a 59.2% reduction in contributing founders. Inbreeding depression disappeared during the periods 1997-2007 and 2007-2017. For the period 1992-1997, the best model resulted in a significantly negative standardised estimate of the new inbreeding coefficient of the litter and a significantly positive standardised estimate of Kalinowski's ancestral inbreeding coefficient of the litter (CI 95% 0.01 to 0.17), which indicated purging of detrimental load. Kindling season and parity had effects on survival at birth that differed across the three periods of 1992-1997, 1997-2007 and 2007-2017., Conclusions: Our results support the existence of inbreeding depression and its purging with respect to kit survival at birth in this Pannon White rabbit population. However, we were unable to exclude possible confounding from the effects of parity and potentially other environmental factors during the study period, thus our results need to be extended and confirmed in other populations.

GRain is freely available software intended to enable and promote testing of hypotheses with respect to purging and heterogeneity of inbreeding depression. The program is based on a stochastic approach, the gene dropping method, and calculates various coefficients from large and complex pedigrees. GRain calculates, together with the 'classical' inbreeding coefficient, ancestral inbreeding coefficients proposed by Ballou, (1997) J. Hered., 88, 169 and Kalinowski et al., (2000) Conserv. Biol., 14, 1375 as well as an ancestral history coefficient (AHC ), defined here for the first time. AHC is defined as the number that tells how many times during pedigree segregation (gene dropping) a randomly taken allele has been in IBD status. Furthermore, GRain enables testing of heterogeneity and/or purging of inbreeding depression with respect to different founders/ancestors by calculating partial coefficients for all previously obtained coefficients., (© 2015 Blackwell Verlag GmbH.)

In a synthetic closed population of Pannon White rabbits, additive (VA ), dominance (VD ) and permanent environmental (VPe ) variance components as well as doe (bF d ) and litter (bF l ) inbreeding depression were estimated for the number of kits born alive (NBA), number of kits born dead (NBD) and total number of kits born (TNB). The data set consisted of 18,398 kindling records of 3883 does collected from 1992 to 2009. Six models were used to estimate dominance and inbreeding effects. The most complete model estimated VA and VD to contribute 5.5 ± 1.1% and 4.8 ± 2.4%, respectively, to total phenotypic variance (VP ) for NBA; the corresponding values for NBD were 1.9 ± 0.6% and 5.3 ± 2.4%, for TNB, 6.2 ± 1.0% and 8.1 ± 3.2% respectively. These results indicate the presence of considerable VD . Including dominance in the model generally reduced VA and VPe estimates, and had only a very small effect on inbreeding depression estimates. Including inbreeding covariates did not affect estimates of any variance component. A 10% increase in doe inbreeding significantly increased NBD (bF d  = 0.18 ± 0.07), while a 10% increase in litter inbreeding significantly reduced NBA (bF l  = -0.41 ± 0.11) and TNB (bF l  = -0.34 ± 0.10). These findings argue for including dominance effects in models of litter size traits in populations that exhibit significant dominance relationships., (© 2012 Blackwell Verlag GmbH.)

Demographic history, current status, and efficiency of the mating strategy were analyzed using the pedigree of Pannon White (PW) rabbits born between 1992 and 2007. Potential accumulation of detrimental effects and loss of genetic diversity were also considered. Calculations and estimates were done most often for ral)bits born in 2007, whereas other reference populations (REFPOPXXXX) were specified explicitly. The pedigree contained 4,749 individuals and 580 founders, and its completeness was 82.1% up to 10 and 94.5% up to 5 generations, respectively. Generation intervals through different pathways averaged 1.2 yr. When adjusted to the pedigree completeness, the amount of inbreeding (Fi) of rabbits was comparable (5.54%) with that of other livestock populations, whereas the 10 (30) founders contributing the most to inbreeding explained a large part of the population inbreeding [i.e., 42.24% (73.18%)]. The ancestral inbreeding coefficient of REFPOP2004 (10.67%) was one-half that of REFPOP2007 (20.66%), showing its strong dependence on pedigree length. Family variance, inbreeding, and realized effective population size were 84.18 (REFPOP2006; this variable could not be calculated for the last year examined), 37.19, and 91.08, respectively. The effective numbers of ancestors, founders, and founder genomes were 48, 26, and 7.33, respectively. Although the circular mating scheme applied was generally effective, the large accumulated reduction in genetic variability indicates the need to revise and improve the current breeding strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]