Association between swine meat quality and quantitative traits using canonical correlation

Abstract

The aim of this study was to identify and qualify the association between quality, performance and carcass traits. Records of 844 animals of a F2 swine population were used to evaluate the association among the sets of meat quality, performance and carcass traits using canonical correlation analysis. Six meat quality, 5 performance and 16 carcass traits were evaluated. It was observed independence in the sets of meat quality and performance traits, because the first canonical correlation (r) was 0.2300, being statistically no-significant. There was no independence among the sets of meat quality and carcass traits, since the first, second and third canonical correlation (r) were, respectively, 0.4138, 0.3481 e 0.3346, statistically significant. In the meat quality traits, there was a predominance of the lightness in the first canonical variable pair. For carcass traits, sirloin weight had absolute predominance. Information about association among traits groups enables selection more efficient to attend the objective of swine genetic improvement program.