*** 9628476 This Small Business Innovative Research Phase II Project focuses on developing technology for the selective breeding of marine shrimp. At present there are more than 2.8 million acres of shrimp farms in production. Shrimp farmed are principally non-selected wild stocks or are produced from unselected farm reared broodstock. Virtually no work has been done to selectively breed shrimp for improved performance in farming environments. If shrimp can be bred for enhanced survival, faster growth, or improved feed conversion, the profitability of farming will be improve. Penaeus vannamei, the principal species raised in the Westem Hemisphere, has been selected for the program. The Phase I research objectives were to obtain and identify stocks that could be used in the breeding program. Work completed in the Phase I research identified 16 unique base sequences in one gene that can be used as markers to unambiguously identify the stocks for the breeding program. The overall objective of the Phase II research is to: Establish populations that are homozygous for alleles that can be used to conclusively identify family lines for the purpose of genetic selection and production of stocks for sale. The activities include: Developing nucleotide probes that can be used to screen individual shrimp for the base sequences that identify a particular allele; Identifying individual shrimp that carry each of the unique base sequences; Raising individual shrimp to sexual maturity; Breeding to establish populations that are homozygous for the identified sequences and; Conducting comparative evaluations of performance in production environments. ***
