CHICKEN MICROSATELLITE MARKERS ISOLATED FROM LIBRARIES ENRICHED FOR SIMPLE TANDEM REPEATS

The total number of microsatellite loci is considered to be at least 1 0-fold lower in avian species than in mammalian species. Therefore, ef ficient large-scale cloning of chicken microsatellites, as required fo r the construction of a high-resolution linkage map, is facilitated by the construction of libraries using an enrichment strategy. In this s tudy, a plasmid library enriched for tandem repeats was constructed fr om chicken genomic DNA by hybridization selection. Using this techniqu e the proportion of recombinant clones that cross-hybridized to probes containing simple tandem repeats was raised to 16%, compared with < 0 .1% in a non-enriched library. Primers were designed from 121 differen t sequences. Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) analysis of two chicken r eference pedigrees enabled 72 loci to be localized within the collabor ative chicken genetic map, and at least 30 of the remaining loci have been shown to be informative in these or other crosses.