Selection of microsatellite markers for genetic mapping

Abstract

The challenges to the genetic improvement in perennial plants using traditional strategies are big and they impose the aggregation of new tools in the study of the variability and of the inheritance to biotic factors. Molecular markers are an important tool in citrus genetic improvement programs through controlled hybridization. They are been used in the genetic characterization of parents, identification of hybrids, genetic mapping and location of QTL. Linkage maps with molecular markers, in function of the saturation degree obtained, are of matter importance in the inheritance study of the resistance to citrus diseases. Co-dominant markers, as microsatellites or Single Sequence Repeats-SSR can be used as anchors to combine linkage maps obtained at different laboratories or with different populations, generating a genetic map that best represents the structure and organization of the different linkage groups. The objective of the present study is to validate molecular markers SSR based on information of ESTs (CitEST) for construction of genetic maps of citrus.