Abstract
Asparagus racemosus Willd. is an important multipurpose plant, recognized as queen of herbs due to its important medicinal properties. The objective of this study was to contribute to the understanding of A. racemosus genetic diversity by genotyping 20 accessions from ten different agro-ecological zones of Kerala state, India using simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers. A set of 22 SSR markers previously developed for A. officinalis were evaluated for polymorphism in A. racemosus accessions and 18 primer pairs were useful and revealed 46 alleles. Transferability from A. officinalis to A. racemosus varied from 60 to 100% and 15 primers were successfully amplified in all the accessions. Thus, the transferability of SSR primers across the species increased the value of such markers as information about Expressed Sequence Tag (EST) derived markers as well as genomic SSR markers for A. racemosus are not currently available. Comprehensive and systematic surveys on A. racemosus diversity revealed 82.81% polymorphism among accessions. The polymorphic information content values of the transferred SSR markers were between 0.05 and 0.48. A set of six unique alleles detected in five accessions may be useful in genotype identification procedures. Cluster analysis placed the accessions into three main clusters. SSRs derived from garden asparagus were a good resource for genetic studies in A. racemosus.
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