Large DNA Study on Arabians and “Arabians”
A large DNA study published in the Journal Nature (link to full study here) comes to confirm what we purist breeders have known for a long time: that so-called “Arabian” horses of flat racing lines have a significant blood of English Thoroughbred running in their veins. The author, Samantha Brooks, very elegantly suggests a different labeling of these “Arabian” lines. I still like “Pseudo-Arabians”, which I coined a decade ago.
If thats the same study I’m thinking of it states that one of the so called racing arabian sires they checked actually has a Byerly Turk Y chromosome– really. That they found that the majority of the racing arabians range from a few percent Thoroughbred to over 60%– that western arabians are significantly inbred with consequent genetic diseases and that the horses tested in the cradle countries of the middle east are diverse with 14 of the 18(?) known equine haplotypes and no known whole body shaking- eia- lavender foal-etc. Which butresses my forever contention that we desperately need to get some help from the Syrians,Bahreinies, Iranians Saudis etc. in the form of equine genetic foreign aid from them to us.
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Bruce Peek
I am finally starting to look at this. It’s interesting that they tested 0 horses that were actually from France, 0 horses that were actually from Syria, 0 horses that were actually from Bahrain. And then 119 horses from Qatar. One wonders if the Amer and Burning Sands sirelines were included in the testing đ
In response to Bruce, I am quoting the relevant passage below, and summarizing: they identified the presence of both A/ the sireline associated with the Byerley Turk (which is found in other breeds influenced by Thoroughbreds, in Arabians, and in the Akhal Teke breed — which they DID note had an ambiguous conclusion as it could mean anything from “they got this from a Thoroughbred sire” to “they all share the same ancestral sireline”) and B/ the Tb-dW1 Whalebone haplotype, which is a known Thoroughbred mutation.
“The 29 non-racing Arabian horses all carried one of three Y haplogroups previously associated with Arabian horses (Fig. 5)21,28. The two most common haplogroups, Ao-1 and Ao-2, were previously documented as ancestral to modern Arabian horses21. The Ta haplogroup is genetically more similar to haplogroups of modern Thoroughbreds, but is only observed in Arabians28. Notably, only two of the 10 male race-use Arabian horses examined carried any of these three Arabian Y haplogroups (Ao-1, Ao-2 and Ta). Five of the race-use horses carried the Tb-oB1* haplogroup attributed to the âByerley Turkâ foundation sire of the Thoroughbred breed28. Tb-oB1* is found within a variety of breeds and lineages, including the Turkomen. Therefore, these five horses may carry Y chromosomes derived from ancestors common to both racing Arabians and the Thoroughbred breed28. However, the remaining three racing Arabian horses carried the Tb-dW1 haplogroup, also known as the Whalebone haplotype. The mutation leading to Tb-dW1 occurred around 180029, after the establishment of the Thoroughbred studbook, and is linked to the âWhaleboneâ sire line within the modern Thoroughbred breed28. Tb-dW1 is almost fixed in Thoroughbred horses and has not been reported previously in modern Arabians. The presence of Thoroughbred-specific Y chromosome haplogroups among Arabian racehorses indicates that the large chromosomal blocks of Thoroughbred origin detected in flat racing Arabian horses are likely derived, at least in part, from crosses with Thoroughbred stallions that occurred after the emergence of the âWhaleboneâ haplotype in the 1800s.”
Perhaps this was intentional as there no such things as “Qatari Arabians”, all from lines established in other countries.
Maddening, all over again, that they do not include the horses tested and their respective pedigrees.
Yes!
Maybe there’s a way to get more details, scientist-to-scientist?
I suspect that the information as to the individual horses used is confidential, and to reveal that would be a breach of ethics.
Most likely. But it couldn’t hurt to find out. (grin)
This is a project I had some involvement with, but Iâve been staying out of discussions because Iâm not a designated spokesperson for the study and Iâm limited on what I can say, due to a confidentiality disclosure agreement.
But just a couple of quick comments for this group. First, due to confidentiality agreements in place when samples are submitted, disclosure of horse/line identity wonât be done (at least not from this study). Also, if anyone has any questions about the sampling â please contact Dr. Brooks directly. Over the past several months Iâve seen some misassumptions made about how sampling was done and unfortunately, some of this has been getting passed around as ‘fact’ in some of the discussions taking place. Also to note that some samples were collected specifically for this study and some sample data came from datasets from other research groups. Also, the final dataset took into consideration relatedness of horses sampled â so for example in the racing set, selection was done for representation of a diverse group of racing bloodlines; it wasnât a bunch of horses from related lines.
I’m hoping arrangements can be made for Dr. Brooks to give a presentation on this study – so people can hear ‘directly from the horse’s mouth’, so to speak. It’s an interesting project with some important information for owners and breeders to understand.
đ
Thanks for this clarification Beth, it provides context.
Thats the thing of course this study and others for that matter document and prove that the arabian horse establishment in the west cannot in any meaningful way be trusted most likely due to their conservative chamber of commerce small business school of thought in which winning a few races is more important than behaving with honor and integrity. Now those kind of people have been caught red handed. This is a good talking point for the need to junk the current waho- aha registry and proceed to an international Asil registry with at least 3 standards of proof of Asil status for the horses and an associated sporthorse registry for Shagya- like horses say 66% to 85% asil blood openly admitted and verified. The new registry could sponsor twice yearly genetic tests and reviews of named horses with published results publicly available for all to see. That should put things right. Oh, and also include a way of setting up a procedure for kicking horses out of the registry and naming their breeders and owners.
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Bruce Peek
I wish there were a way to do that. I try not to offend people about their “Pure Polish” or Russian or Spanish, but? They are NOT pure, and there should be a
separate stud book. JMHO.