Comparative genomic analysis of Atlantic salmon, Salmo salar, from Europe and North America
Date
2010-11-23
Authors
Lubieniecki, Krysztof P.
Jones, Stacy L.
Davidson, Evelyn A.
Park, Jay
Koop, Benjamin F.
Walker, Seumas
Davidson, William S.
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
BioMed Central
Abstract
Background: Several lines of evidence including allozyme analysis, restriction digest patterns and sequencing of
mtDNA as well as mini- and micro-satellite allele frequencies indicate that Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar) from North
America and Europe are genetically distinct. These observations are supported by karyotype analysis, which
revealed that North American Atlantic salmon have 27 pairs of chromosomes whereas European salmon have 29
pairs. We set out to construct a linkage map for a North American Atlantic salmon family and to compare this map
with the well developed map for European Atlantic salmon.
Results: We used microsatellite markers, which had previously been mapped in the two Atlantic salmon SALMAP
mapping families from the River Tay, Scotland, to carry out linkage analysis in an Atlantic salmon family (NB1)
whose parents were derived from the Saint John River stock in New Brunswick, Canada. As large differences in
recombination rates between female and male Atlantic salmon have been noted, separate genetic maps were
constructed for each sex. The female linkage map comprises 218 markers in 37 linkage groups while the male map
has 226 markers in 28 linkage groups. We combined 280 markers from the female and male maps into 27
composite linkage groups, which correspond to the haploid number of chromosomes in Atlantic salmon from the
Western Atlantic.
Conclusions: A comparison of the composite NB1 and SALMAP linkage maps revealed the reason for the
difference in the chromosome numbers between European and North American Atlantic salmon: Linkage groups
AS-4 and AS-32 in the Scottish salmon, which correspond to chromosomes Ssa-6 and Ssa-22, are combined into a
single NB1 linkage group as are linkage groups AS-21 and AS-33 (corresponding to chromosomes Ssa-26 and Ssa-
28). The comparison of the linkage maps also suggested some additional chromosomal rearrangements, but it will
require finer mapping, potentially using SNPs, to test these predictions. Our results provide the first comparison of
the genomic architecture of Atlantic salmon from North America and Europe with respect to chromosome
organization.
Description
BioMed Central
Keywords
Citation
Lubieniecki et al.: Comparative genomic analysis of Atlantic salmon, Salmo salar, from Europe and North America. BMC Genetics 2010 11:105.