ArticleGenetics2021
Why genetic selection to reduce the prevalence of infectious diseases is way more promising than currently believed.
Article in Genetics, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 16 papers.
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Who cites it
16 citing papers in PubMed, 42 citations in OpenAlex.
- Impact of genomic selection for disease resistance on the spread of infection in a simulated aquaculture population.Genetics, selection, evolution : GSE · 2026Article
- Estimation of Genetic Variance and Breeding Values for Infectious Disease Susceptibility From Simulated Longitudinal Data Using Generalized Linear Mixed Models Based on Transmission Dynamics.Journal of animal breeding and genetics = Zeitschrift fur Tierzuchtung und Zuchtungsbiologie · 2026Article
- Age-structured next generation matrix and RInfectious Disease Modelling · 2026Article
- Review
- Evaluation of genomic selection to improve survival of eastern oysters infected withFrontiers in genetics · 2026Article
- Understanding the direct and indirect impacts of disease response phenotypes on chicken coccidiosis epidemiology: A modelling approach.PloS one · 2026Article
- Article
- SIRE 2.0: a novel method for estimating polygenic host effects underlying infectious disease transmission, and analytical expressions for prediction accuracies.Genetics, selection, evolution : GSE · 2025Article
- Application of Genomic Selection in Beef Cattle Disease Prevention.Animals : an open access journal from MDPI · 2025Review
- Genetic estimates and genome-wide association studies of antibody response in Tanzanian dairy cattle.Frontiers in genetics · 2025Article
- Predicted breeding values for relative scrapie susceptibility for genotyped and ungenotyped sheep.Genetics, selection, evolution : GSE · 2024Article
- Applying genetic technologies to combat infectious diseases in aquaculture.Reviews in aquaculture · 2023Review
- Can breeders prevent pathogen adaptation when selecting for increased resistance to infectious diseases?Genetics, selection, evolution : GSE · 2022Article
- Optimal experimental designs for estimating genetic and non-genetic effects underlying infectious disease transmission.Genetics, selection, evolution : GSE · 2022Article
- Functional Variants Associated WithFrontiers in genetics · 2022Article
- On the origin of the genetic variation in infectious disease prevalence: Genetic analysis of disease status versus infections for Digital Dermatitis in Dutch dairy cattle.Journal of animal breeding and genetics = Zeitschrift fur Tierzuchtung und Zuchtungsbiologie · 2021Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Genetic selection for improved disease resistance is an important part of strategies to combat infectious diseases in agriculture. Quantitative genetic analyses of binary disease status, however, indicate low heritability for most diseases, which restricts the rate of genetic reduction in disease prevalence. Moreover, the common liability threshold model suggests that eradication of an infectious disease via genetic selection is impossible because the observed-scale heritability goes to zero when the prevalence approaches zero. From infectious disease epidemiology, however, we know that eradication of infectious diseases is possible, both in theory and practice, because of positive feedback mechanisms leading to the phenomenon known as herd immunity. The common quantitative genetic models, however, ignore these feedback mechanisms. Here, we integrate quantitative genetic analysis of binary disease status with epidemiological models of transmission, aiming to identify the potential response to selection for reducing the prevalence of endemic infectious diseases. The results show that typical heritability values of binary disease status correspond to a very substantial genetic variation in disease susceptibility among individuals. Moreover, our results show that eradication of infectious diseases by genetic selection is possible in principle. These findings strongly disagree with predictions based on common quantitative genetic models, which ignore the positive feedback effects that occur when reducing the transmission of infectious diseases. Those feedback effects are a specific kind of Indirect Genetic Effects; they contribute substantially to the response to selection and the development of herd immunity (i.e., an effective reproduction ratio less than one).
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Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.