Abstract

The Chilean isopod Excirolana hirsuticauda is a marine benthic brooder with wide distributional range and low potential for long-distance dispersal. Eleven microsatellite markers were developed for E. hirsuticauda using enriched libraries. Characterization of those loci in 35 individuals from Playa Blanca beach showed high allelic diversity with a mean of 10.9 alleles per locus. The average expected and observed heterozygosities were 0.65 and 0.41. These microsatellite loci are the first published for any Excirolana species and should be useful to study the genetic structure of E. hirsuticauda. © 2008 The Authors.