Generation of clonal Atlantic salmon lines for experimental studies: A pre-project proposal

In mammalia, standardized experimental materials such as inbred mice or rats, genetically well-characterised rabbit or chicken lines are readily available. No such material is available for funtional studies in Atlantic salmon. Thus, this projects focus i s to generate clonal, well-characterised Atlantic salmon lines useful for a variety of functional studies. Androgenesis represents a relatively simple way to produce homozygous individuals in fish in only one generation. Further reproduction of these homo zygous individuals will be used to establish well-defined clonal lines. The benefit of using Atlantic salmon as a research model system, is that generated information of commercial value is directly useable on the farmed animal. A well-defined homogeneo us material is invaluable in a variety of studies: 1. Study of basic biological aspects 2. Study of disease processes and disorders – directly on a production animal 3. Genetic studies: QTL-mapping purposes 4. Shot-gun sequencing