Diversity studies in genetic resources of Solanum spp. (section Petota) by comparative application of ISAP markers

Abstract

The Genebank at the Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research (IPK) harbours three different potato collections comprising 2846 wild potato accessions, 2757 accessions of cultivars, landraces and breeding material of Solanum tuberosum L. and 579 Solanum clones originating mainly from South and Central America (as of July 2016). The three collections are maintained via seeds, in vitro culture, cryopreservation or in the field. All four processes are labour and cost intensive. Therefore, methods facilitating the efficient management and maintenance of the collections are needed. We describe the experimental application of the retrotransposon-based Inter-SINE amplified polymorphism (ISAP) marker system for supporting the management of potato collections. Three ISAP primer combinations were evaluated on a set of 259 cultivated and 89 wild potato accessions focussing on three different aspects: diversity analysis, duplicate identification and phylogenetic studies. Compared to up to 29 microsatellites, ISAPs were similarly efficient in monitoring genetic diversity and detecting duplicated accessions. In addition, the three ISAP primer combinations could be applied to wild potato species, although their use in phylogenetic studies is limited due to their highly polymorphic nature. Generally, ISAPs are a very valuable tool in the maintenance of clonally maintained potato collections and for the verification of the identity of accessions.