Bovine genome mapping: evolutionary inference and the power of comparative genomics.

All bovine chromosomes are now represented by a syntenic group, a linkage map and at least one in situ hybridization. Almost 1,000 loci are mapped, about 300 of which are coding sequences useful for comparative mapping and evolutionary inference. Economically important loci are beginning to appear on bovine linkage maps and enhanced comparative maps are likely to be necessary to identify many of these genes by a comparative positional candidate gene approach.