Abstract
Amplified fragment length polymorphisms (AFLP) were used to evaluate the genetic diversity between 18 date palm (Phoenix dactylifera L.) varieties (11 females and 7 males) collected from the center of Iraq. Six primer pairs were applied to detect polymorphism between varieties. A total of 83 polymorphic AFLP fragments were detected with an average of 13.8 polymorphic fragments/primer combination. Genetic distance was estimated using Jaccard’s genetic similarity index and was ranged from 0.07 to 0.75. Unweighted pair group method with arithmetic mean UPGMA ordered date palm varieties into two main clusters independently of their origin and sex. The first cluster consisted of three sub-clusters. The first one consisted of five female varieties and one male, while the second sub-clusters consisted of five male varieties. The third one consisted of five varieties; four were females and one male. The second main cluster consisted of the remaining two female varieties. Moreover, all primer combinations contributed to the discrimination of date palm varieties, suggesting the efficiency of AFLP method in assessing genetic diversity in date palm. A large range of genetic diversity characterized Iraqi date palm germplasm. Key words: Genetic diversity, amplified fragment length polymorphisms (AFLP) polymorphisms, molecular characterization, Phoenix dactylifera L.
Highlights
Date palm (Phoenix dactylifera L.) (2n = 2x = 36) is of a great socio-economic importance in the Arabian region
All primer combinations contributed to the discrimination of date palm varieties, suggesting the efficiency of Amplified fragment length polymorphisms (AFLP) method in assessing genetic diversity in date palm
A total of 252 scorable bands were generated from six selective AFLP primer combinations (Table 2)
Summary
Date palm (Phoenix dactylifera L.) (2n = 2x = 36) is of a great socio-economic importance in the Arabian region. It is believed to have originated in Mesopotamia (Wrigley, 1995). The numbers of known date palm cultivars distributed all over the world are approximately 5000, out of them 650 are found in Iraq (Ibrahim, 2008). Gulf and Iran-Iraq wars, many palm trees were destroyed and more died when the southern marshes were drained. Genetic diversity of this crop was negatively affected by these ecological stresses. The use of suitable genetic markers will allow researchers to estimate genetic diversity which will aid in the genetic conservation of date palm
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