Genetic evaluation of broiler growth using non-linear model

To predict the expected body weight of bird at a specific age, mathematical modelling of growth data is important. However growth models in general do not consider between animal variation as well as contribution of fixed and random effects. In the present study, non-linear Gompertz model was fitted to growth data of broiler and model parameters were explained through a mixed effect model comprising. More than 96% data fitted very well to the model (R²>95%). The matured adult body weight (W_m) for pooled data was obtained as 2217.28±20.96g. The heritability for parameter W_m was estimated as 0.31, which indicated that addtive genetic variance component is important for this parameter and may be exploited for genetic selection. This strategy helps in identifying between bird variation and estimation of genetic component for growth model parameters having biological significance.