Development and characterization of novel cross-species tetranucleotide microsatellite markers for sterlet ([i]Acipenser ruthenus[i]) from Chinese sturgeon ([i]Acipenser sinensis[i])

Development and characterization of novel cross-species tetranucleotide microsatellite 1 markers for sterlet (Acipenser ruthenus) from Chinese sturgeon (Acipenser sinensis) 2 Yacheng Hu 1,2,# , Jing Yang 1,2,# , Xueqing Liu 1,2 , Kan Xiao 1,2 , Binzhong Wang 1,2 and Hejun Du 1,2* 3 1 .Chinese Sturgeon Research Institute, China Three Gorges Corporation, Yichang Hubei 443100, 4 China 5 2. Hubei Key Laboratory of Three Gorges Project for Conservation of Fishes, Yichang Hubei 6 443100, China 7 #: Equal contributors, Yacheng Hu and Jing Yang contribute equally to this investigation and 8 should be considered co-first authors. 9 * Corresponding author. 10 Hejun Du 1,2 11 Chinese Sturgeon Research Institute, China Three Gorges Corporation, Yichang Hubei 443100, 12 China 13 E-mail address: du_hejun@ctg.com.cn 14 15 Abstract: Sterlet (Acipenser ruthenus) is an important economic fish because of its nourishing 16 caviar, isinglass and flesh. In order to facilitate the recovery of this species, the full understanding 17 of its population genetic structure is necessary for taking appropriate management actions. 18 However, genetic data on the use of nuclear loci in sterlet is still quite poor because microsatellite 19 markers in sterlet that had been developed appeared to be polyploidy which add difficulties in 20 studying the genetic of the sterlet. In this study, 24 tetranucleotide microsatellite markers were 21 developed in sterlet from 160 microsatellite markers of the endangered Chinese sturgeon 22 (Acipenser sinensis). Ten (ZHX76, ZHX64, Z194, Z217, Z184, Z242, Z250, Z258, Z268 and 23 Z269) of the 24 loci showed disomic patterns while the rest loci showed tetrasomic patterns. In 24 this paper, 24 microsatellite markers were characterized in 16 sterlet individuals and all of them 25 were polymorphic with 2 to 7 alleles per locus. The Hardy-Weinberg departure value (d), 26 polymorphic information content (PIC), the observed heterozygosity (HO), the Shannon-Wiener 27 Diversity Indices (H') and the mean expected heterozygosity (HE) of all 24 polymorphic loci 28