Genetic Diversity Among Finnish Six-Rowed Barley Cultivars Based on Cpedigree Information and DNA Markers

Abstract

Genetic diversity among Finnish six-rowed spring barleys was studied by both pedigree analysis and random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) markers. 26 six-rowed barley varieties have been released by Finnish plant breeders, 22 of which are based on controlled crosses. These 22 varieties originate from 14 ancestors, of which 7 (Olli, Asplund, Vega, Gull, Hanna, Maskin, OAC21) are principal ancestors with a coancestry r 0.05. Contribution of the principal ancestors to the pedigrees of the varieties has not changed significantly during the 60 years of barley breeding in Finland. Jaccard's similarity indices, based on 54 polymorphic RAPD markers, were calculated for a set of modern, ancestral and introgression lines and varieties. Jaccard's indices varied from 0.154 to 0.935, and similarities between related accessions were significantly higher (t-test, P 0.01) than between the unrelated ones. Correlation between kinship coefficients based on pedigrees and Jaccard's indices were weak, and Jaccard's indices varied widely for accessions without a known pedigree. The genetic similarity within the old varieties is comparable to that of the modern varieties.