Description
The Collaborative Cross (CC) recombinant inbred panel was conceived as an ideal resource for mammalian system genetics. The pre-CC is a proof-of-concept experiment involving CC lines that have undergone at least five generations of inbreeding. Siblings from these lines were each involved in one of four distinct phenotyping arms, then genotyped on a high-density Affymetrix platform. The genetic profile of these emerging lines reveals high diversity, balanced allele frequencies, and well-distributed recombination all ideal qualities for a mapping panel. We have mapped white spot, a discrete trait; body weight, a highly polygenic complex trait; and more than 11,000 liver gene expression traits. These analyses provide a glimpse of the potential mapping power and resolution of the CC.