Genome-wide mining of simple sequence repeats and development of polymorphic SSR markers in Aquilaria malaccensis

Aquilaria malaccensis is one of the economically important tree species distributed in North-east India which produces oleoresinous heartwood known as Agarwood - the most expensive wood in the world. There are limited genomic resources in this species. Therefore, the publicly available whole-genome sequence of Aquilaria agallocha, which is a synonym of A. malaccensis, was utilized for genome-wide mining of Simple Sequence Repeats (SSR) and to develop polymorphic SSR markers. In total 2,53,155 SSRs were identified from the draft genome. Primers were designed for di-nucleotide and tri-nucleotide repeats and screening of 90 such primers have resulted in the identification of 10 polymorphic markers. The present report is the first one for exhaustive identification of SSRs from the draft genome of the species. The SSR markers identified in the present study may be efficient in genomic analyses and useful in the genetic assessment and conservation of A. malaccensis.