Mitochondrial DNA Variability among Some Saudi Arabian Goat Breeds

Five hundred nucleotides of cytochrome b gene was sequenced for Pakistani, Tihami, Syrian, Masri and Aardi goat breeds inhabiting Saudi Arabia. Based on two computational maximum-parsimony and neighbor-joining methods, the constructed tree clustered the studied breeds into Masri and Tihami in one group and Pakistani and Aardi came basal to this group. Syrian breed came basal to all of the studied breeds. This division was based on a few mitochondrial DNA sites and few sampling size and it therefore needs to be supported in a further molecular study. The goat breeds studied herein did not show any non-synonymous genetic variability when the protein-coding gene of the mitochondrial genome was used as a molecular maker. However, the only mitogenome maker which can show base differences among these breeds was the non-coding displacement loop (d-loop). In conclusion, using the mitochondrial genes, rather than the d-loop, for studying genetic diversity among goat breeds is with no meaning and it is better to use other markers for this purpose.