Course summary

Research in the field of Genetics and Genomics aims to advance the understanding of complex animal systems and the development of improved predictive models through the application of numerical and computational approaches to the analysis of the genome. This includes analyses and interpretation, modelling, and prediction of complex animal systems at multiple levels, from the sequence and behaviour of DNA, RNA species, proteins and other molecules, through cellular and gene networks, tissues and organs right up to whole organisms and interacting populations of organisms. The biology and traits of interest include:

• growth and development

• body composition

• feed efficiency

• reproductive performance

• greenhouse gas emissions and other indices of sustainability

• environmental adaptation

• responses to infectious disease and the interactions between host and pathogen

• population responses to selection

• inherited diseases

• behavioural and welfare-associated traits

• cattle

• pigs

• poultry

• sheep

• farmed fish such as salmon or tilapia

• other aquaculture species such as oysters and mussels

• companion animals

• organisms of emerging agricultural interest, for example insect species

• genetics (molecular, quantitative)

• physiology (neuroendocrinology, immunology)

• ‘omics (genomics, functional genomics, metabolomics, proteomics, epigenomics, metagenomics etc.)