Estimation of heritability using half-sib model under correlated errors

Abstract

In general, statistical models for estimation of heritability follow certain assumptions, i.e. random components including the error follow a normal distribution and are identically independently distributed. But in the practical situation, sometimes these assumptions are violated. Thus, from the perspective of plant and animal breeding programs, estimating various genetic variances and inferring their inheritance based on estimations of various genetic parameters is studied. In the present study, estimation of heritability for the half-sib model is considered with correlated error, and sire and error follow a range of different distributions like normal, Cauchy, beta, and t- distribution. Two error structures AR(1) and AR(2) was considered and observations for correlated and uncorrelated cases were generated using a one-way classification model. The developed procedure was applied using the generated observations using simulation. Various heritability ranges, such as high and low (0.5, 0.1), Half-sib AR(1), varied sample sizes (100 and 500), and various correlations of errors between AR(1) and AR, were used to obtain the data (2). ρ= -1 to +1. It was noticed that correlated errors a significant effect on heritability estimation and are highly affected by the distribution it follows.