A Review on the Analysis of Population Genetic Structure using Dominant Molecular Markers and Introducing the New Program STRUCTUREasy

Abstract Analysis of population genetic structure using multilocus data, is generally performed by sequential run of the three computer programs, namely STRUCTURE, CLUMPP, and Distruct. The two latter programs lack Graphical User Interface (GUI), and the user must manually create inputs and settings files, using text editors out of the program environment. A number of facilitating programs have been developed, which are online, or dependent on statistical packages such as R. In this paper, after reviewing the aims and methods for analyzing the structure of populations using dominant molecular marker data, a new computer program, STRUCTUREasy is introduced. This program simplifies the analysis procedures, with no need for programing skills. STRUCTUREasy is an open source program with a simple user interface, running in Microsoft Office. Its application is for the extraction of Q-matrices of STRUCTURE and connecting the input files to downstream software, for providing ease of use, and more accuracy and pace, in population structure analysis using multilocus markers. This program runs in Microsoft Access 2016, and performs well in extracting data and settings between STRUCTURE, CLUMPP and Distruct software, for accuracy and pace.