Journal of Heredity Advance Access originally published online on December 23, 2004
Journal of Heredity 2005 96(2):85-88; doi:10.1093/jhered/esi017
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On the Estimation of Genome-wide Heterozygosity Using Molecular Markers
From the Department of Forestry and Natural Resources, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN 479071159
Address correspondence to Andrew DeWoody at the address above, or e-mail: dewoody{at}purdue.edu.
Coltman and Slate (2003) recently performed a meta-analysis on studies that investigated the association between genetic variation at microsatellite loci and phenotypic trait variation. One factor not explicitly addressed in their meta-analysis is the actual estimation of genome-wide heterozygosity via molecular markers. Many authors still associate marker-estimated heterozygosity with genome-wide heterozygosity, despite allozyme-based evidence that such correlations are usually very weak or nonexistent. Here, we show that genome-wide heterozygosity is poorly estimated not only by allozymes but also by microsatellite loci and by single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs). Thus, associations between fitness (or other phenotypes) and heterozygosity should be established firmly on causative factors and not on simple correlations.
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