Short communication: Identification of cultivated and wild Vaccinium species grown in Portugal

Márcia Carvalho,Manuela Matos,Valdemar Carnide

doi:10.5424/sjar/2018163-12502

Abstract

Vaccinium crops offer a variety of benefits for human health due their high levels of antioxidants. Genetic diversity between two Vaccinium species (sixteen cultivars of Vaccinium corymbosum and three wild populations of Vaccinium myrtillus) were evaluated using Inter Simple Sequence Repeat (ISSR) markers. In V. corymbosum 74 polymorphic markers corresponding to 83.2% of polymorphism were obtained while in V. myrtillus only four polymorphic markers corresponding to 83.2% and 10.6% of polymorphism were observed. The dendrogram obtained showed a clear division into two distinct groups corresponding to the two analyzed species. V. corymbosum group is divided in different sub-clusters based on cultivars pedigree relationships. Twenty-eight specific bands were detected in total; 6 for V. corymbosum and 22 for V. myrtillus. Results allowed the selection of five primers due it potential to detect specific bands in the two species. These markers could be useful for identifying species and cultivars and consequently help in the management of germplasm collections and in breeding programs.

Highlights

In recent years Vaccinium crops have emerged internationally as having a high economic value
In V. corymbosum 74 polymorphic markers corresponding to 83.2% of polymorphism were obtained while in V. myrtillus only four polymorphic markers corresponding to 83.2% and 10.6% of polymorphism were observed
Twenty-eight specific bands were detected in total; 6 for V. corymbosum and 22 for V. myrtillus

Summary

Introduction

In recent years Vaccinium crops have emerged internationally as having a high economic value. Genetic diversity between two Vaccinium species (sixteen cultivars of Vaccinium corymbosum and three wild populations of Vaccinium myrtillus) were evaluated using Inter Simple Sequence Repeat (ISSR) markers. ISSRs are dominant markers, dispersed throughout the plant genome (Zietkiewicz et al, 1994; Kumar et al, 2009) and are very useful in genetic diversity studies and in identification and characterization of cultivars, clones and species of Vaccinium (Debnath, 2007a,b; 2009; Garriga et al, 2013; Carvalho et al, 2014).

Results

Conclusion