Li et al. Genetics Selection Evolution 2010, 42:32 http://www.gsejournal.org/content/42/1/32 Page 7 of 14 Figure 1 Detailed view of the extent and significance of LD in the cattle populations using the Haploview 4.0 program. Numbers in the blocks indicate the percentage of the LD metric D’ values > 0.3; shadings indicate Fisher’s exact test significance levels: white, P > 0.05; light shading, P < 0.05. detected as being directionally selected and two (AGLA17 and TGLA227) as under balancing selection. Overall, across all the populations, two loci, AGLA17 and SOD1, exhibited the strongest evidence of selection with all three statistical approaches, which provided good support to their status as outliers due to selection. Two loci (DIK5019 and TGLA227) exhibited significant departure from the neutral expectations in two out of the three selection tests. Furthermore, 12 loci (AGLA29, BMS2361, BM2113, ETH10, ETH225, CSSM66, ETH152,