The development and application of a multiplex short tandem repeat (STR) system for identifying subspecies, individuals and sex in tigers

Poaching and trans‐boundary trafficking of tigers and body parts are threatening the world's last remaining wild tigers. Development of an efficient molecular genetic assay for tracing the origins of confiscated specimens will assist in law enforcement and wildlife forensics for this iconic fla...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Integrative zoology 2015-07, Vol.10 (4), p.376-388
Main Authors: ZOU, Zheng-Ting, UPHYRKINA, Olga V., FOMENKO, Pavel, LUO, Shu-Jin
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Amur tiger
Animals
Conservation of Natural Resources
DNA, Mitochondrial - genetics
Female
Genes, sry
genetic
Male
Microsatellite Repeats
multiplex
Panthera tigris altaica
Sequence Analysis, DNA
sexing
short tandem repeat
Species Specificity
Tigers - genetics
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Poaching and trans‐boundary trafficking of tigers and body parts are threatening the world's last remaining wild tigers. Development of an efficient molecular genetic assay for tracing the origins of confiscated specimens will assist in law enforcement and wildlife forensics for this iconic flagship species. We developed a multiplex genotyping system “tigrisPlex” to simultaneously assess 22 short tandem repeat (STR, or microsatellite) loci and a gender‐identifying SRY gene, all amplified in 4 reactions using as little as 1 ng of template DNA. With DNA samples used for between‐run calibration, the system generates STR genotypes that are directly compatible with voucher tiger subspecies genetic profiles, hence making it possible to identify subspecies via bi‐parentally inherited markers. We applied “tigrisPlex” to 12 confiscated specimens from Russia and identified 6 individuals (3 females and 3 males), each represented by duplicated samples and all designated as Amur tigers (Panthera tigris altaica) with high confidence. This STR multiplex system can serve as an effective and versatile approach for genetic profiling of both wild and captive tigers as well as confiscated tiger products, fulfilling various conservation needs for identifying the origins of tiger samples.
ISSN:1749-4877
1749-4869
1749-4877
DOI:10.1111/1749-4877.12136