Cross-species applicability of chicken microsatellite markers for investigation of genetic diversity in Indian duck (Anas platyrhynchos) populations

We obtained blood samples of 57 Indian ducks (Anas platyrhynchos) belonging to three indigenous duck populations of geographically distinct locations of the country and genotyped them using chicken microsatellite markers. Twenty three of the 30 loci were amplified and 17 loci yielded high success rate (>91%). Observed and effective number of alleles ranged from 4 to 21 and 1.80 to 13.34, respectively. The observed heterozygosity across populations ranged from between 0.15 and 0.91, with mean (+/- SE) of 0.63 +/- 0.21, while the expected heterozygosity ranged 0.45 to 0.94 with mean (+/- SE) of 0.72 +/- 0.13. The polymorphic information content (PIC) ranged from 0.43 to 0.92 with an average of 0.68. Eleven loci confirmed Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium (P>0.05) and no evidence for linkage disequilibrium was observed among pairs of loci. Dendrogram based on Nei's genetic distance grouped Assam and West Bengal duck populations and separated the Uttarakhand duck population. The results provide evidences of the applicability of chicken microsatellite markers in determining the genetic variations and relationship among three ducks populations in India.