Abstract
Sesame is an important oil crop widely cultivated in Africa and Asia. Understanding the genetic diversity of accessions from these continents is critical to designing breeding methods and for additional collection of sesame germplasm. To determine the genetic diversity in relation to geographical regions, 96 sesame accessions collected from 22 countries distributed over six geographic regions in Africa and Asia were genotyped using 33 polymorphic SSR markers. Large genetic variability was found within the germplasm collection. The total number of alleles was 137, averaging 4.15 alleles per locus. The accessions from Asia displayed more diversity than those from Africa. Accessions from Southern Asia (SAs), Eastern Asia (EAs), and Western Africa (WAf) were highly diversified, while those from Western Asia (WAs), Northern Africa (NAf), and Southeastern Africa (SAf) had the lowest diversity. The analysis of molecular variance revealed that more than 44% of the genetic variance was due to diversity among geographic regions. Five subpopulations, including three in Asia and two in Africa, were cross-identified through phylogenetic, PCA, and STRUCTURE analyses. Most accessions clustered in the same population based on their geographical origins. Our results provide technical guidance for efficient management of sesame genetic resources in breeding programs and further collection of sesame germplasm from these different regions.
Highlights
Sesame (Sesamum indicum L.) has been described as one of the oldest oilseed plants used by humans [1,2]
We examined the genetic diversity of a representative set of sesame accessions from 22 countries of Africa and Asia
The field experiment was conducted at the Oilcrops conducted at the Oilcrops Research Institute located in Wuhan, Hubei province (China)
Summary
Sesame (Sesamum indicum L.) has been described as one of the oldest oilseed plants used by humans [1,2] It is a diploid species with 2n = 2x = 26 chromosomes that belongs to the family of Pedaliaceae, Sesamum genus, and is the most commonly cultivated edible oil crop species out of over 30 species in this genus [3,4]. Breeding efforts in sesame have been aimed at the production of white seeded varieties with high market value, shorter duration, and inbuilt tolerance to drought and high temperatures Attributes such as resistance to phyllody, higher yields, improved plant architecture, and indehiscent capsules have been incorporated [14]. Many studies have dissected the genetic diversity of sesame accessions using different types of molecular markers (Random Amplified Polymorphic DNA (RAPD) [25,26,27], Inter-simple. The overall goal is to provide a comprehensive insight into sesame diversity between and within these continents for a better management of the genetic resources used in breeding programs
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