ISSR analysis of Tulipa suaveolens (Liliaceae) populations from throughout the European part of the species range reveal genetic patterns shaped by Pleistocene transgressions of the Caspian Sea

Abstract

Tulipa suaveolens Roth is a decorative bulbous, polycarpic species in the Liliaceae family. Currently, the species populations are declining due to the degradation of natural steppes. In the present article, we evaluated the genetic diversity of 216 specimens from 22 natural T. suaveolens localities in the European part of the species range using 10 inter simple sequence repeat (ISSR) markers. The polymerase chain reaction (PCR) yielded 250 unambiguous and reproducible polymorphic bands with a mean polymorphism information content (PIC) value of 0.27. Neither the principal component analysis nor the clustering method split the dataset. However, the Bayesian model‐based STRUCTURE analysis detected two genetic clusters of T. suaveolens. The analysis of the biogeographical distributional pattern of the revealed genetic groups confirmed our hypothesis that the evolution and distribution of T. suaveolens were likely affected by the Early Khvalynian transgression of the Caspian Sea and the following Enotayevsk regression. Furthermore, this hypothesis was supported by the results of the NEW HYBRIDS analysis identifying the specimens from the populations located outside the Early Khvalynian flooding limit as pure parents, while the specimens of the populations within the flooding limit were classified as backcrosses and second generation hybrids.