Babatunde Olasege

Babatunde is a PhD student at the School of Chemistry and Molecular Biosciences. His PhD focuses on using genomic information to understand the interplay between male and female fertility traits in tropically adapted beef cattle. It is well-established that favourable genetic correlation exists between male and female fertility traits. However, precise localization of the regions driving these favourable correlations is currently lacking. My research aims to localize these regions to understand the genetic architecture of polygenic traits better. Moreover, weighting the information of these drivers of genomic correlation in both sexes could potentially increase the accuracy of genomic prediction within and across breeds. The outcome of my PhD could lead to the improvement of fertility traits, especially in females, since more selection intensity can be placed on their male counterparts as indicator traits.

Babatunde’s principal advisor is Dr. Marina Fortes.