People

Current and past members and visitors

Ivan Pocrnić

Career Track Fellow

My main research interest is in the development of novel breeding methodologies and tools.  This work involves a synergy between theoretical quantitative genetics and practical animal breeding.  My main expertise is the application of genomic selection on big datasets for various species (pig, chicken, cattle, etc.) and various models, with emphasis on single-step genomic prediction.

Before beginning my tenure-track role at The Roslin Institute, I served as a core scientist at HighlanderLab under Gregor Gorjanc, and previously as a postdoctoral researcher with Ignacy Misztal at the University of Georgia (USA), where I also earned my PhD in Animal Genetics and Breeding. My experience includes work with Croatia’s national department for breeding value estimation (Croatian Agricultural Agency). I hold an MSc in Animal Genetics and Breeding and a BSc in Agricultural Economics from the University of Zagreb (Croatia). I serve as a member of the Commission on Animal Genetics at the European Federation of Animal Science (EAAP). 

Ivan Pocrnic

Christina Marie (Chrissy) Rochus

Core Scientist in Quantitative Genetics and Breeding

I have a background in animal science and genetics with a BSc(Hons) in Animal Biology and a MSc in Integrative Biology from the University of Guelph (Canada), and a double PhD in Animal Breeding and Genetics from the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (Sweden) and AgroParisTech/INRAE (France).  I completed postdoctoral training at Uppsala University (Sweden), Wageningen University (the Netherlands) and the University of Guelph before becoming a Core Scientist in the Pocrnic Lab.

My research interests include working with genomic data to study genetic diversity and adaptation.  I have worked on a variety of domestic species including Atlantic salmon, sheep chicken, pig, turkey and dairy cattle, and have over 13 years of research experience resulting in over 30 coauthored peer-reviewed publications, conference papers, and technical reports for the animal breeding industry.

Chrissy Rochus

Bruna Folegatti Santana

KTP Associate in Artemia Quantitative Genetics and Breeding

I hold academic training in animal breeding and genetics, with an emphasis on quantitative traits. Focusing on the genetic improvement of populations, my previous research projects have included predicting breeding values, estimating genetic parameters, and comparing statistical models. I have also worked on analysing the genetic architecture of complex traits and evaluating the effect of causative variants on the accuracy of (genomic) estimated breeding values.

I am currently developing and implementing a breeding programme for artemia farming and pioneering scalable, affordable, improved and sustainable artemia cysts for the aquaculture hatchery industry.

Bruna Santana

Yiwen Li

MSc Quantitative Genetics, Research Project Student

Co-supervised by Daniel Tolhurst (Roslin Innovation Fellow), my project is on "Novel experimental design strategies for allocating animals to growing environments".

Areej Ali Almuhayya

Visiting Scientist

I am a bioinformatician in Saudia Arabia's National Livestock and Fisheries Development Program, and am visiting the Pocrnic Lab to develop skills in simulation, genomic selection and population genetics.

Past members and visitors

2024 Simona Antonios INRAE France Visiting PhD student
2024 Cheng Zeng University of Edinburgh UK MSc Bioinformatics - Research project Copy number variant genome-wide association study for milk production traits in sheep
2024 Isabella Contu University of Sassari Italy BSc Animal Science - Summer Internship
2024 Giulia Bugiolacchi University of Sassari Italy BSc Animal Science - Summer Internship
2024 Ignacy Misztal University of Georgia USA Visiting scientist
2023 Haoyuan Zhang University of Edinburgh UK BSc Mathematics and Statistics - Summer Internship Brief introduction to deepGBLUP