EST-derived microsatellites in Pseudosciaena crocea and their applicability to related species

Simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers were obtained for the large yellow croaker Pseudosciaena crocea using 1 205 expressed sequences tags (ESTs) from the NCBI database. Primers for 48 EST-SSR. loci were designed and screened with 30 P.crocea specimens captured from Guanjingyang sea area in Fujian Province of China. Sixteen of the loci were polymorphic, which were amplified with 3 to 11 alleles per locus and the mean of 6.13. The observed and expected heterozygosity per locus ranged from 0.091 to 0.844 (mean 0.544) and from 0.118 to 0.892 (mean 0.644), respectively. Polymorphic information content (PIC) ranged from 0.115 to 0.866 (mean 0.593). The results for cross-species amplification of the 16 large yellow croaker EST-SSRs on P. polyactis, C. niveatus, C. lucidus, A. argentatus and J. belengeri revealed that 14, 12, 11, 7 and 6 loci were successfully amplified with 1 to 10 alleles with an average of 4.5 per locus, respectively, which are suitable for population genetics studies of these species and useful for phylogenetic relationship analysis among these species. Overall, this study provides a set of type I markers for population genetics studies and genome mapping for large yellow croaker and its closely related species.