A Diagnostic Panel of SNPs Distinguishing Between Farmed and Wild Atlantic Salmon

Each year farmed salmon escape from net pens, enter rivers, and interbreed with wild salmon. This may weaken the viability and productivity of wild salmon. Little is however known about the rate of gene flow from farmed to wild salmon, except in experimental situations. Here we present a set of 60 single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) that collectively distinguish between Norwegian farmed and wild salmon, regardless of the origin of the farmed or the wild salmon. These SNPs were identified from 7000 SNPs by comparing 13 historical samples of wild salmon populations with 12 different strains of farmed salmon.  The identified panel of SNPs permits quantification of genetic changes in wild populations that can be ascribed to escaped farmed salmon.