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Isolation and characterization of eleven novel microsatellite markers for fine-scale population genetic analyses of Gammarus pulex (Crustacea: Amphipoda)

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Abstract

The freshwater amphipod species Gammarus pulex (Linnaeus, 1758) is widespread across Europe and Asia and is able to live in a broad range of environmental conditions. Yet, it is of great interest to which degree it is able to tolerate and adapt to the current rapid anthropogenic environmental changes affecting its habitat, such as pollution, changes in river morphology, and invasions of alien gammarid species. Microsatellite primers for genetic population studies with G. pulex have been developed but due to the existence of several genetically different lineages within the species, the application of these primers is not always successful. In order to investigate the impacts of anthropogenic environmental changes on the spatio-genetic patterns of G. pulex lineage E in streams in the Saale river catchment in Germany, we designed eleven novel polymorphic microsatellites for this lineage using a high-throughput sequencing approach. These microsatellites enabled highly specific characterization of three closely related populations. The results show genetically distinct populations reflected by both a principal coordinates analysis and an analysis of molecular variance. Several of the newly designed microsatellite primers also enabled successful cross-amplification of the respective microsatellites in specimens of G. pulex lineage C, while only two microsatellites were amplified successfully and showed polymorphisms for all of the analyzed specimens of G. fossarum Koch, 1836. The microsatellites identified here are suitable for future assessments of micro-evolutionary dynamics of G. pulex from central Germany.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by UFZ—Helmholtz Centre of Environmental Research (POF III-T32). We would like to thank firstly Dr. Alexander Weigand and Dr. Daniel Grabner from the University Duisburg-Essen for providing specimens of G. pulex from the Ruhr area, and secondly, the two anonymous reviewers for constructive comments, which contributed to the improvement of the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Effect-Directed Analysis, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research - UFZ, Permoserstr. 15, 04318, Leipzig, Germany

    Vid Švara & Werner Brack

  2. Department of Ecosystem Analysis, Institute for Environmental Research (Biology V), RWTH Aachen University, Worringerweg 1, 52074, Aachen, Germany

    Vid Švara & Werner Brack

  3. State Office of Criminal Investigations Saxony-Anhalt, Lübecker Str. 53-63, 39124, Magdeburg, Germany

    Helge Norf

  4. Department of Bioanalytical Ecotoxicology, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research - UFZ, Permoserstr. 15, 04318, Leipzig, Germany

    Till Luckenbach

  5. Department of Community Ecology, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research - UFZ, Theodor-Lieser-Straße 4, 06120, Halle, Germany

    Stefan G. Michalski

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  1. Vid Švara
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  2. Helge Norf
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Correspondence to Vid Švara.

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Švara, V., Norf, H., Luckenbach, T. et al. Isolation and characterization of eleven novel microsatellite markers for fine-scale population genetic analyses of Gammarus pulex (Crustacea: Amphipoda). Mol Biol Rep 46, 6609–6615 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11033-019-05077-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11033-019-05077-y

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