Bayesian Methods in Animal Breeding with Different Prior Specification Using Gibbs Sampling

Authors: M. Ziya FIRAT

Abstract: An application of Gibbs sampling in animal breeding is carried out using two different types of prior specification. The first specification has full conjugacy and the second one has non-conjugacy, which causes computational difficulties. This paper demonstrates how the Gibbs sampling procedure, making use of an adaptive rejection sampling algorithm, deals with non-conjugacy in animal breeding using a balanced one-way classification with a random sire effects model and compares the results of two different specifications. It is also shown how Bayesian methods solve the problem of obtaining a negative estimated variance.

Keywords: Adaptive rejection sampling, log-concavity, sire model, Gibbs sampling, variance components