The Genetic Profiles of two Salmonid Populations from Romania Obtained through Nuclear Markers Analysis

Abstract

The Salmonidae fish family is well represented in Romanian fauna, with a total of six species in the wild and reared in fish farms. Among them, the brown trout (Salmo trutta fario) can be found in all major Romanian river basins. However, anthropogenic activities might disrupt salmonids’ habitats, so that inbreeding and genetic isolation might easily occur in the wild populations. We analyzed two wild brown trout populations from rivers targeted by anthropogenic activities, by using nuclear markers and genotyping in order to observe their genetic structure. We analyzed nine microsatellites and we observed their alleles frequencies, number of private alleles, observed and expected heterozygosity, as well as their population structure. The two populations are not in Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium for most of the loci and the inbreeding coefficient for both populations suggests a heterozygote deficit. Further sequencing data are needed in order to have a better view upon their complete genetic structure

Keywords

• salmonids
• wild populations
• microsatellites
• genotyping