Fig. 4

The causative CNV and its distribution in pig breeds with different ear sizes. a Structure of the CNV. The red arrows indicate the location of the breakpoint between two copies of the CNV and the red vertical line shows the binding site of miR-584-5p. b The breakpoint of the CNV. Lowercase letters represent the sequences of the CNV. A 33-bp sequence repeat at the 3′-end of the CNV is indicated by gray shading and grass green. c CNV distribution in the 19 F₀ founders of the White Duroc × Erhualian F₂ intercross. For each animal, the CNV genotypes were in complete concordance with the QTL genotypes. The Y-axis shows the RQ values obtained by qPCR, the X-axis indicates each individual’s ID and its QTL genotypes. d CNV distribution in pig breeds with different ear sizes. All pigs with large and floppy ears had the CNV, while none of the small-eared pigs had it