RAPID DEVELOPMENT OF MICROSATELLITE MARKERS FOR PANDANUS BONINENSIS (PANDANACEAE) BY PYROSEQUENCING TECHNOLOGY

Premise of the study: To facilitate rapid development of microsatellite or simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers, an expressed sequence tags (EST) database was constructed for Pandanus boninensis, an evergreen tree endemic to the Bonin Islands, using pyrosequencing technology. Methods and Results: We designed primers for 340 EST-SSRs identified from 109 620 pyrosequencing reads, 48 of which were tested for PCR amplification. Thirty-four primers provided clear amplification, and 26 of those 34 displayed clear polymorphic patterns in sampled populations, with mean expected heterozygosity at the amplified loci ranging from 0.022 to 0.742 (average 0.262). Conclusions: The developed markers are promising tools for future genetic studies of P. boninensis and related species.