Cross-amplification of microsatellite markers across agarwood-producing species of the Aquilarieae tribe (Thymelaeaceae)

Abstract

Tree species in the Aquilarieae tribe of the Thymelaeaceae family produce agarwood, a natural product highly valued for its fragrance, but the species are under threat due to indiscriminate harvesting. For conservation of these species, molecular techniques such as DNA profiling have been used. In this study, we assessed cross-amplification of microsatellite markers, initially developed for three Aquilaria species (A. crassna, A. malaccensis, and A. sinensis), on ten other agarwood-producing species, including members of Aquilaria (A. beccariana, A. hirta, A. microcarpa, A. rostrata, A. rugosa, A. subintegra, and A. yunnanensis) and Gyrinops (G. caudata, G. versteegii, and G. walla), both from the Aquilarieae tribe. Primers for 18 out of the 30 microsatellite markers successfully amplified bands of expected sizes in 1 sample each of at least 10 species. These were further used to genotype 74 individuals representing all the 13 studied species, yielding 13 cross-amplifiable markers, of which only 1 being polymorphic across all species. At each locus, the number of alleles ranged from 7 to 23, indicating a rather high variability. Four markers had relatively high species discrimination power. Our results demonstrated that genetic fingerprinting can be an effective tool in helping to manage agarwood genetic resources by potentially supporting the chainof-custody of agarwood and its products in the market.

Genetic Diversity Study on Geographical Populations of the Multipurpose Species Elsholtzia stauntonii Using Transferable Microsatellite Markers

“…In the present study, the transferability observed (9.05%) was similar to the average of approximately 10% reported in cross-genera transferability studies of eudicots between 1997 and mid-2006 ( Barbará et al, 2007 ). However, the percentage transferability determined here was lower than the cross-genera amplification percentage observed in some families, such as Bignoniaceae (40.58%) ( Kalia et al, 2020 ) and Cactaceae (35.16%) ( Bombonato et al, 2019 ), and much lower than that between species within the same genus ( Miranda et al, 2020 ; Pern et al, 2020 ; Li et al, 2021 ). The transferability of SSR markers between species or genera is determined by the conservation of DNA sequences and the stability of primer binding sites in flanking regions of SSRs during evolution ( Ellegren, 2000 ; Saeed et al, 2016 ).…”

α-Glucosidase Inhibitory Activity and Quantitative Contribution of Phenolic Compounds From Vietnamese Aquilaria crassna Leaves

“…However, in other places, the farmers have changed their cultivation techniques in order to grow this plant to yield leaves by trimming the tree to keep it small, similar to a tea tree. 4,5…”

“…However, in other places, the farmers have changed their cultivation techniques in order to grow this plant to yield leaves by trimming the tree to keep it small, similar to a tea tree. 4,5 Apart from agarwood, the leaves of Aquilaria have traditionally been used as a herbal tea for laxative, anti-inflammatory, sedative, and pain-relieving purposes. 6 It has been widely reported that Aquilaria leaves are a very rich source of polyphenols, such as xanthones, flavonoids, and benzophenones.…”

The complete chloroplast genome of Walla Patta,Gyrinops walla(Thymelaeaceae), an agarwood-producing tree species from Sri Lanka

“… 2018 ; Pern et al. 2020 ). In this study, we characterized the complete chloroplast (cp) genome sequence of G. walla to serve as a valuable genomic resource for the conservation effort of this important agarwood-producing plant species and to determine its evolutionary relationship to other genera classified in the Thymelaeaceae.…”

“…Scientific studies were widely conducted on G. walla after identifying its ability of producing agarwood resins (Subasinghe and Hettiarachchi 2013). However, genetic research on this species is still limited (Eurlings and Gravendeel 2005;Farah et al 2018;Pern et al 2020). In this study, we characterized the complete chloroplast (cp) genome sequence of G. walla to serve as a valuable genomic resource for the conservation effort of this important agarwood-producing plant species and to determine its evolutionary relationship to other genera classified in the Thymelaeaceae.…”