Quantitative Genetics · Iowa State University
Attending WCGALP 2026 — let's connectI'm Andrea Núñez Andrade, a PhD candidate in animal breeding & genetics studying social genetic effects — how one animal's genes ripple outward to shape the feeding time, competition for feeder space, and maternal traits of the group around it.
Profile
I build statistical models that separate an animal's direct genetic effect from its social one — the part of its neighbors' performance that traces back to its own genes.
My dissertation applies this idea across commercial swine populations: feeding time and competition for feeder space captured by automatic feeders, maternal traits in group-housed gestating sows, and a genomic search for the regions that drive both, in collaboration with PIC and Topigs Norsvin.
I grew up in Tegucigalpa, Honduras, and trained as an agronomist at Zamorano University under its "Learn by Doing" philosophy. After directing Honduras's National Livestock Traceability System at SENASA, I came to the University of Florida for a master's in animal genetics with Dr. Raluca Mateescu.
Along the way I've mentored international students through the Zamorano alumni network and kept a small Substack on science and writing.
Dissertation
Using automatic feeder data, I model how the pig that feeds just before you — the one you "follow" — leaves a genetic fingerprint on your own feeding time and competition for feeder space.
Group housing reshapes gestation for sows. I estimate the direct and social genetic components of maternal traits, testing whether selection that ignores pen-mates leaves welfare and productivity on the table.
A proposed single-step GWAS to map the genomic regions behind both the direct and social components at once. In progress.
Master's research · University of Florida
Before swine, I worked on beef-cattle thermotolerance with Dr. Raluca Mateescu — mapping how breed composition and genetics shape the skin and epidermis properties that help cattle withstand heat stress.
Science communication
A short take on my research — social genetic effects, explained for anyone, not just quantitative geneticists. Explaining the work plainly is part of how I think it should be done.
Watch on YouTube →Toolbox
Beyond the model
Reviewer for the journal, on topics from feed-intake rhythms to quantitative-genetic methodology.
Presenter at NSIF. Attending WCGALP 2026 — if you're there, let's connect.
A Substack where the notebook habit meets the research life.
Read →Former director of the National Livestock Traceability System — genetics grounded in real herd operations.
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