Development of microsatellite genetic markers in Siberian larch (Larix sibirica Ledeb.) based on the de novo whole genome sequencing

This special issue of the journal is devoted to the outstanding population geneticist Yuri Petrovich Altukhov, who paid much attention in his research to the development of molecular genetic markers for population studies. Over the past time markers and methods of their development have undergone significant change. Thanks to modern methods of whole genome sequencing, it has become possible to develop markers of very different types—selectively neutral, as well as functional. Among them, microsatellite markers remain the most informative, convenient, reproducible, relatively inexpensive, and polymorphic. Whole genome sequencing greatly facilitates their discovery and development. This paper is devoted to the development of new microsatellite markers for a very important species of boreal forest—Siberian larch (Larix sibirica Ledeb.). Using a draft assembly of the larch genome, several thousand contigs containing microsatellite loci with di-, tri, tetra-, and pentanucleotide motifs were selected. A total of 59 pairs of PCR primers were tested for loci with dinucleotide motifs as the most variable. From them, 11 pairs were finally selected for 11 loci with dinucleotide repeats, which showed a high level of polymorphism and can be used in various population genetic studies and to identify the origin of wood and plant material. This study was done at the Laboratory of Forest Genomics of the Genome Research and Education Center of the Siberian Federal University with the support of the Department of Forest Genetics and Forest Tree Breeding of the Georg-August University of Göttingen, the Department for Monitoring of Forest Genetic Resources of the Forest Protection Center of the Krasnoyarsk Territory, and the Laboratory of Forest Genetics and Selection of the Sukachev Institute of Forest of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences within the framework of the project “Genomics of the Key Boreal Forest Conifer Species and Their Major Phytopathogens in the Russian Federation” funded by the Government of the Russian Federation (grant no. 14.Y26.31.0004).