Conclusions
We described here the combination of techniques which will make genetic
data for polyploids more accessible and facilitate population genetic
and evolutionary studies of polysomic species. Together, these methods
address some of the standing challenges to developing genetic resources
for polyploids, including the identification of homeolog-specific
genetic variants, inference of ploidy-aware genotypes, and estimation of
parentage and other population genetic statistics. We demonstrate the
efficacy of these techniques for white sturgeon, a polysomic and ploidy
variable species of strong conservation concern in the Pacific
Northwest. The molecular markers we present will greatly facilitate the
conservation management of imperiled populations. These markers, along
with our updated genotyping-by-thousands pipeline, allow the efficient
generation of genetic data and estimation of ploidy for large numbers of
samples from diverse tissue collections. These data will help
researchers address a number of outstanding questions, including the
efficiency and effects of alternative conservation schemes including
hatchery spawning, repatriation, and translocation of white sturgeon in
the Columbia River Basin. Although questions remain about the
segregation of chromosomes and individual loci in white sturgeon, our
examinations suggest the loci described here are reliably tetrasomic for
putatively octoploid individuals.