Polymorphism at LEI0258 microsatellite locus in guinea fowl and chicken breeds

A guinea fowl population and three chicken populations i.e. White Leghorn (WL), Aseel (AS) and Red Cornish (RC) were genotyped at LEI0258 locus. In guinea fowl, only one allele i.e. 247 bp was observed at LEI0258 locus, however in chicken breeds, sizable polymorphism was observed. Numbers of alleles ranged from 5 in White leghorn to 11 in Aseel, however across the chicken breeds, 15 alleles were observed. In Red Cornish, comparatively narrower range of alleles (193 bp to 295 bp) was observed against the much wider range in Aseel (234 bp to 590 bp) and White Leghorn (205 bp to 608 bp).While, 608 bp allele was found specific for WL with a frequency of 0.20, 193 bp allele with a frequency of 0.107, 220 bp allele with a frequency of 0.25 and 274 bp allele with a frequency of 0.178 were specific to RC. The numbers of specific alleles were 5 in AS i.e. 321 bp, 405 bp, 420 bp, 443 bp & 552 bp and all these alleles showed a low allelic frequencies ranging from 0.033 to 0.066. Hence the present study revealed no allelic variation in guinea fowl, however wide allelic variation was observed in chicken breeds.