Abstract

Marine invertebrates show a high diversity of embryonic developmental modes and reproductive behaviour. However, little is known about the factors that are promoting the evolution of different strategies. The gastropod Crepidula coquimbensis has a direct embryonic development with encapsulated embryos showing a cannibalistic behaviour. Preliminary observations suggest that victim embryos are not randomly chosen. With intracapsular multipaternity, the intensity of cannibalism might vary according to the relatedness of the siblings. Paternity analyses based on highly polymorphic markers can provide valuable insights into this cannibalism behaviour. Ten polymorphic microsatellite loci were thus developed: the level of polymorphism is large enough to perform paternity analysis and investigate relatedness in this species. © 2007 The Authors.