Research article

Development of an integrative database with 499 novel microsatellite markers for Macaca fascicularis

Atsunori Higashino¹ , Naoki Osada² , Yumiko Suto³ , Makoto Hirata² , Yosuke Kameoka² , Ichiro Takahashi² and Keiji Terao¹

¹Tsukuba Primate Research Center, National Institute of Biomedical Innovation, 1-1 Hachimandai, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-0843, Japan

²Department of Biomedical Resources, National Institute of Biomedical Innovation, 7-6-8 Saito-Asagi, Ibaraki, Osaka 567-0085, Japan

³Department of Research and Development, Central Blood Institute, Japanese Red Cross Society, 2-1-67 Tatsumi, Koto-ku, Tokyo 135-8521, Japan

author email corresponding author email

BMC Genetics 2009, 10:24doi:10.1186/1471-2156-10-24

Published:	5 June 2009

Abstract

Background

Cynomolgus macaques (Macaca fascicularis) are a valuable resource for linkage studies of genetic disorders, but their microsatellite markers are not sufficient. In genetic studies, a prerequisite for mapping genes is development of a genome-wide set of microsatellite markers in target organisms. A whole genome sequence and its annotation also facilitate identification of markers for causative mutations. The aim of this study is to establish hundreds of microsatellite markers and to develop an integrative cynomolgus macaque genome database with a variety of datasets including marker and gene information that will be useful for further genetic analyses in this species.

Results

We investigated the level of polymorphisms in cynomolgus monkeys for 671 microsatellite markers that are covered by our established Bacterial Artificial Chromosome (BAC) clones. Four hundred and ninety-nine (74.4%) of the markers were found to be polymorphic using standard PCR analysis. The average number of alleles and average expected heterozygosity at these polymorphic loci in ten cynomolgus macaques were 8.20 and 0.75, respectively.

Conclusion

BAC clones and novel microsatellite markers were assigned to the rhesus genome sequence and linked with our cynomolgus macaque cDNA database (QFbase). Our novel microsatellite marker set and genomic database will be valuable integrative resources in analyzing genetic disorders in cynomolgus macaques.