| Summary: | Premise of the study: As only six useful microsatellite loci that exhibit broad cross-amplification are so far available for <i>Prosopis</i> species, it is necessary to develop a larger number of codominant markers for population genetic studies. Simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers obtained for <i>Prosopis</i> species from a 454 pyrosequencing run were optimized and characterized for studies in <i>P. alba</i> and <i>P. chilensis</i>.
Methods and Results: Twelve markers that were successfully amplified showed polymorphism in <i>P. alba</i> and <i>P. chilensis</i>. The number of alleles per locus ranged between two and seven and heterozygosity estimates ranged from 0.2 to 0.8. Most of these loci cross-amplify in <i>P. ruscifolia</i>, <i>P. flexuosa</i>, <i>P. kuntzei</i>, <i>P. glandulosa</i>, and <i>P. pallida</i>.
Conclusions: These loci will enable genetic diversity studies of <i>P. alba</i> and <i>P. chilensis</i> and contribute to fine-scale population structure, indirect estimation of relatedness among individuals, and marker-assisted selection.
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