Abstract

OCHOA-CHAVEZ, José Miguel; RIO-PORTILLA, Miguel Ángel Del; CALDERON-AGUILERA, Luis Eduardo  and  ROCHA-OLIVARES, Axayácatl. Genetic connectivity of the endangered brown sea cucumber Isostichopus fuscus in the northern Gulf of California revealed by novel microsatellite markers. Rev. Mex. Biodiv. [online]. 2018, vol.89, n.2, pp.563-567. ISSN 2007-8706.  https://doi.org/10.22201/ib.20078706e.2018.2.2294.

Isostichopus fuscus is an economically important sea cucumber that has been highly exploited along its distribution range in the eastern Pacific. The significant population decline is responsible for its listing as endangered in the IUCN Red List. Despite its importance for management and conservation, information about its population genetic structure is unavailable, largely due to the lack of suitable genetic markers. Here we develop species-specific microsatellite markers and use them to assess the genetic connectivity between populations in the Gulf of California. Next generation sequencing (Illumina) was used to shotgun-sequence the genome of 2 sea cucumbers. From these data, we identified and characterized 19 polymorphic microsatellite loci; which were tested in organisms from Bahía de los Ángeles, on the western shore of the Gulf of California. The number of alleles ranged from 5 to 22, observed heterozygosity from 0.35 to 1, and 4 loci deviated from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium. We determined high levels of genetic connectivity between this locality and San Felipe, in the upper gulf (Amova φst = 0.002; p > 0.05) with a subset of 8 markers. The newly designed microsatellites are suitable for multiplexing panels and will be useful for the future genetic assessment of this important tropical sea cucumber.

Keywords : Holothurid; Fisheries; Conservation genetics; Next generation sequencing; Genome sequencing.

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