Abstract
The American horseshoe crab (Limulus polyphemus) is an economically and ecologically important species, which is currently categorized as endangered in Mexico. L. polyphemus, one of four extant horseshoe crab species that constitute the class Merostomata, is distributed along the Atlantic coastline of the USA from Alabama to Maine and has another population on the coastline of Campeche, Yucatan, and Quintana Roo in the Yucatan Peninsula, Mexico. In the present study, we evaluated the genetic diversity and genetic structure of four separated localities along the coast of the Yucatan peninsula (Champoton, CH; Isla Arena, IA; Rio Lagartos, RL; and Holbox Island, HI), using nine microsatellite-type molecular markers for this species. The aim of this study is to obtain a baseline of the current level of genetic diversity, which would allow the monitoring of important changes over time. Multilocus analyses revealed moderate levels of genetic diversity (He, 0.5230 to 0.6389) and genetic structure within the whole study area (FST 0.025). The population from RL showed limited gene flows, differing significantly from the other sampling sites. The genetic information obtained in this study can support the implementation of management and conservation programs for this species in Mexico.
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Data are given in the Supplementary Materials section.
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Acknowledgements
This work was financially supported by CONACYT (PDCPN 2015-1097) and TecNM (Grant No. 10162.21-P). We thank Laura Margarita Marquez Valdelamar and Nelly María López Ortiz from the Biodiversity and Health Genomic Sequencing Laboratory of the Biology Institute of the National Autonomous University of Mexico, for their support to analyze the samples in the 3730xl DNA Analyzer sequencer.
Funding
This work was financially supported by TecNM (Grant No. 10162.21-P) and by CONACYT (Grant, DCPN 2015–1097).
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All authors have been personally and actively involved in substantial work leading to the paper and will take public responsibility for its content. Here, all co-authors agreed with the following the CRediT (Contributor Roles Taxonomy) author statement: ZBR and SGJJ contributed to conceptualization; ZBR, SGJJ, VHH, OLHJ, and ARGA contributed to methodology; ZBR and VHH contributed to validation; ZBR and VHH contributed to formal analysis; ZBR, VHH, and OLHJ contributed to investigation, ZBR contributed to resources; ZBR and VHH contributed to writing of the original draft; ZBR, SGJJ, and VHH contributed to writing, reviewing, and editing of the manuscript; VHH, OLHJ, and ARGA contributed to visualization; ZBR contributed to supervision, ZBR and SGJJ contributed to project administration and SGJJ contributed to funding acquisition.
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Zamora-Bustillos, R., Sandoval-Gío, J.J., Ortiz-León, H.J. et al. Microsatellite Loci of the Atlantic Horseshoe Crab (Limulus polyphemus) Reveal Inter-Localities Genetic Diversity in the Coastal Waters of the Eastern and Northern Yucatan Peninsula. Biochem Genet 61, 945–962 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10528-022-10292-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10528-022-10292-7