author(s)
Humera Hamid, Muhammad Ameen Jamal, Irfan Ahmed, Shahzad Munir, Sikandar Ali, Hafiz Muhammad Wariss and Mir Zulqarnain Talpur

abstract
Based on customers’ demand, focus on sensory quality and nutritional characteristic of chicken meat production has been increased in past several decades. From the last few years, development in molecular genetics controls the identification of genes, or markers related with genes that upset chickens meat quality. The meat industries are consistently producing high quality meat. However, there have been profound necessities to understand the biochemical and genetic factors that affect the meat quality. The current focus is on genetic factors affecting physical quality of chicken meat. Further, pH of meat plays a vital role in the evaluation of quality of freshness as well as seasonal meat products. Complex quantitative traits such as water holding capacity (WHC) and drip associated meat quality features is also affected due to multiple genes. Meat tenderness got a substantial genetic constituent. Earlier research on gene expression exposed a massive set of genes which are mentioned in clusters of high/low pH and drip loss. These biological trails were the basis of the candidate genes. This is one of the reasons why the identification of a single gene with ample influence on chickens’ meat quality is very difficult. So, the main focus of this review is to compile identified candidate genes and single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) associated with meat quality traits of chicken.