Edaphic natural selection of allozyme polymorphisms in Aegilops peregrina at a Galilee microsite in Israel

Abstract

Allozymic diversity in proteins encoded by 19 loci was analysed electrophoretically in 70 individual plants of the wild tetraploid wheat Aegilops peregrina, from a microsite at Tabigha, north of the Sea of Galilee, Israel. The test involved a 100 m transect, equally subdivided into basalt and terra-rossa soil types and comparisons were based on the two polymorphic esterase loci. Significant genetic differentiation according to soil type was found over very short distances. Our results suggest that allozyme polymorphisms in A. peregrina are adaptive and that they differentiate primarily by soil selection, probably through aridity stress.