Isolation and characterization of 48 polymorphic microsatellite markers for the blood clam Scapharca broughtonii (Arcidae).

Blood clams (Scapharca broughtonii) are widely cultivated and consumed in noutheast Asia. Forty-eight polymorphic microsatellite loci were developed for this clam using magnetic-bead hybridization enrichment. The number of alleles per locus ranged from 2 to 14. Polymorphism of these loci was assessed in 30 individuals from a population collected from coastal areas of Qingdao, China. The values of observed heterozygosity, expected heterozygosity and polymorphism information content per locus ranged from 0.1034 to 0.9655, from 0.1831 to 0.9208, and from 0.1638 to 0.8964, respectively. Forty-three of 48 loci conformed to Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium. These microsatellite loci would be useful for molecular genetic breeding, population genetics, genome mapping, and other relevant research on S. broughtonii.