Elucidating critical factors for establishing an efficient breeding program for Atlantic halibut

Atlantic halibut (Hippoglossus hippoglossus) is traditionally a highly valued seafood, but due to overfishing and subsequent stock collapses it has become scarce. The production of Atlantic halibut has shown a positive trend in recent years but still remains at a low level. The main reason for this is the lack of breeding programs available for halibut. As is known from other commercially cultivated aquaculture species, breeding programs have increased the production efficiency substantially. Thus, we want to evaluate if it is possible to establish a breeding program for Atlantic halibut as well. Effective breeding programs aim to maintain genetic diversity to avoid inbreeding. Establishment of a breeding program requires a founder population with sufficient genetic diversity. Therefore, during this project we are planning to determine genetic diversity in the brood stock populations of four different companies. Further, we need a breeding goal and a plan for how to register and select desirable production traits. The breeding strategy and selection of the traits will be based on persisting challenges in the production cycle. Compared to terrestrial agriculture species, many aquaculture species are highly fecund, mass spawned and communally reared, these practices pose challenges to breeding programs. Evaluating the two commonly employed breeding program strategies will help in choosing the right one for halibut: 1. Family based breeding program is a traditional breeding program that maintains genetic diversity through independent family lines. 2. Tracing and identifying families through the use of genetic markers, including microsatellites and single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) panels have shown to be an effective alternative.

Atlantic halibut is traditionally a highly valued food fish, but due to overfishing and subsequent stock collapses it has become scarce. The production of Atlantic halibut has shown a positive trend in recent years but still remains at a low level. The main reason for this low level is the lack of breeding programs available for halibut. As we know from Atlantic salmon, breeding has increased the production efficiency substantially. Thus, we want to evaluate if it is possible to establish a breeding program for Atlantic halibut as well. Establishment of a breeding program requires a founder population with sufficient genetic diversity. Therefore, during this project we are planning to determine genetic diversity in the brood stock populations of company A, B and C. Further, we need a breeding goal and a plan for how to register and select desirable production traits and these we will do based on persisting challenges in the production cycle. In order to choose the right breeding strategy we will evaluating two breeding programs: 1. Family based breeding program and 2. Trace and identify families with the use of genetic markers, including microsatellites and SNP panels During this project we are planning to answer the following questions: 1. Is there sufficient genetic variation in the brood stock pool to establish a breeding program for company A, B and C? Are there sufficient sibling groups that can be tested on? Is relative genetic uniformity necessarily a disadvantage? 2. What should be the breeding goal? Are there significant SNP explaining the majority of genetic variation of the following traits? Do individuals in relative uniform pops exhibit extreme phenotypes for certain trait? 3. What is the right breeding strategy? 1)Family based with 300 families or 2)Trace and identify families with the use of genetic markers What are the practical and economic consequences of choosing 1 or 2? What is the profitability of the breeding program?