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The Sicilian goats are characterized by a strong population admixture structure, caused by geographical location of the farms, influences of natural mating and traditional breeding systems where flock represents an important breeding unit. Nowadays, several local populations are reared in Sicily, some of which do not have a recognized defined genetic structure, having taken origin from several crosses between animals of different breeds/populations sharing the same environment. The aim of this work was to characterize the Sicilian autochthonous goat populations using microsatellite markers and genetic polymorphisms of casein genes.

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Salvatore Mastrangelo was born on 3rd July 1984. In 2009 he graduated in Agricultural Science and in 2014 became PhD in Animal Breeding and Genetics at the University of Palermo, working in biotechnology and conservation genetics applied to livestocks

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