About the Authors

Xiaolei Liu

Affiliations Key Laboratory of Agricultural Animal Genetics, Breeding and Reproduction, Ministry of Education, College of Animal Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, Hubei, China, Institute for Genomic Diversity, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, United States of America

Meng Huang

Affiliation Department of Crop and Soil Sciences, Washington State University, Pullman, Washington, United States of America

Bin Fan

Affiliation Key Laboratory of Agricultural Animal Genetics, Breeding and Reproduction, Ministry of Education, College of Animal Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, Hubei, China

Edward S. Buckler

Affiliations Institute for Genomic Diversity, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, United States of America, United States Department of Agriculture (USDA)–Agricultural Research Service (ARS), Ithaca, New York, United States of America

Zhiwu Zhang

Zhiwu.Zhang@WSU.edu

Affiliations Department of Crop and Soil Sciences, Washington State University, Pullman, Washington, United States of America, Department of Animal Sciences, Northeast Agricultural University, Harbin, Heilongjiang, China

Competing Interests

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: ZZ BF ESB. Performed the experiments: XL. Analyzed the data: XL MH. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: XL ZZ. Wrote the paper: ZZ XL. Supervised the design of the study: ZZ BF ESB.