Real-time PCR identification of lake whitefish Coregonus clupeaformis in the Laurentian Great Lakes.

The purpose of this study was to develop a real-time PCR assay to specifically identify lake whitefish Coregonus clupeaformis in larval fish assemblages based on a 122 bp amplicon from the mitochondrial genome. The efficiency of the reaction, as calculated from the standard curve, was 90.77% with the standard curve having an r(2) value of 0.998. Specificity of the assay provided single melt peak in a melt-curve analysis and amplification of only the target species. The assay successfully identified target DNA in as low as 0.1% proportion of a DNA mixture. This assay was designed on the portable Smart Cycler II platform and can be used in both field and laboratory settings to successfully identify C. clupeaformis.