Allele survival in storage of gametes and embryos for conservation

The paper presents the analysis of the probability distribution of founder alleles in the semen storage of a small cattle population. The probability distribution is estimated by simulating mendelian segregation of distinct (not identical by descent) founder alleles throughtout the pedigree at an autosomal locus (gene dropping technique). The marginal probability distributions of 1) the number of distinct founder alleles survived, 2) the contribution by founder of distinct alleles, 3) the number of copies for distinct allele present in the population are investigated. Given gene frequencies at a BoLA locus in the founders, for each allele survival probability and probability to be present with a single copy in the semen storage is computed. The anaivsis can be used to select the animals to be stored.