Japanese quail microsatellite loci amplified with chicken-specific primers

Forty-eight primer pairs for chicken (Gallus gallus) microsatellite loci we re tested in polymerase chain reaction (PCR) amplification of Japanese quai l (Coturnix japonica) genomic DNA. Amplification products were obtained fro m 28 primer-pairs (58.3%) after optimizing the PCR conditions. Eleven (22.9 %) of these generated specific products and 17 yielded nonspecific amplific ation products. Eight-markers (ADL0037, ADL0038, ADL0142, ADL0143, ADL0206, ADL0325, ADL0366, and HUJ006) were polymorphic and three were monomorphic (ADL0023, ADL0024, and ADL0257) in four Japanese quail populations. Specifi c amplification products from each of the 11 PCR primers were sequenced. Se ven of the eight polymorphic and one of three monomorphic markers contained simple tandem repeats. Six of these microsatellite loci (ADL0037, ADL0315, ADL0142, ADL0143, ADL0366 and ADL0257) may be homologous to the correspond ing chicken loci from which the markers were developed.