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Title: Characteristics of Eleven Polymorphic Microsatellite Markers in the Red Imported Fire Ant, Solenopsis invicta Buren

Author
item GARLAPATI, RAJESH - MS STATE UNIV. STARKVILLE
item CROSS, DAVID - MS STATE UNIV. STARKVILLE
item Perera, Omaththage
item CAPRIO, MICHAEL - MS STATE UNIV. STARKVILLE

Submitted to: Molecular Ecology Notes
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 4/7/2008
Publication Date: 2/5/2009
Citation: Garlapati, R.B., Cross, D., Perera, O.P., Caprio, M. 2009. Characteristics of Eleven Polymorphic Microsatellite Markers in the Red Imported Fire Ant, Solenopsis invicta Buren. Molecular Ecology Notes. 9:822-824.

Interpretive Summary: Red important fire ant, Solenopsis invicta, is an invasive species of significant economical and ecological importance. Population genetic data are scarce for this species due to lack of genetic markers suitable for large scale studies. We employed an enrichment protocol to isolate genetic markers and characterized 11 markers sufficiently variable to study natural populations of this species. These microsatellite markers are currently being used to study fire ant populations in southern United States.

Technical Abstract: We have isolated and characterized an additional 11 polymorphic microsatellite loci in the invasive ant Solenopsis invicta from a population within the United States. Primers were developed for the new microsatellite regions and their variability was tested on 96 worker ants collected from monogyne mounds in Lauderdale County, Mississippi. The observed and effective number of alleles ranged from two to six (average 3.1818 + 0.0486) and 1.31 to 2.64 (average 1.9684+ 0.0455), respectively. The observed and expected heterozygosity values ranged from 0.1613 to 0.7826 (average 0.4319 + 0.0486) and 0.1491 to 0.6242 (average 0.4630+ 0.0486), respectively. The polymorphism information content of the microsatellites ranged from 0.1482 to 0.6208. Pair-wise tests did not detect linkage disequilibrium between any pair of loci.