Novel and cross-species amplifiable microsatellite markers in two Acroporaspecies

The development of microsatellite markers specific to corals (especially those of the genus Acropora) is difficult for various reasons (e.g. the small genome size and low number of microsatellite loci within the genome). Therefore, we developed a novel microsatellite marker and also attempted to apply those developed from other coral species to investigations of our target species, Acropora digitiferaand Acroporasp. We found that six available markers, including the novel marker, could be used for these two target species, along with commonly observed repeat motifs corresponding to six microsatellite loci. These markers may be appropriate for use with other species of this genus.