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Background  Tunisia is considered a secondary center of diversification of durum wheat and has a large number of abandoned old local landraces. An accurate investigation and characterization of the morphological and genetic features of these landraces would allow their rehabilitation and utilization in wheat breeding programs. Here, we investigated a diverse collection of 304 local accessions of durum wheat collected from five regions and three climate stages of central and southern Tunisia.    Results  Durum wheat accessions were morphologically characterized using 12 spike- and grain-related traits. A mean Shannon-Weaver index ( H′ ) of 0.80 was obtained, indicating high level of polymorphism among accessions. Based on these traits, 11 local landraces including Mahmoudi, Azizi, Jneh Khotifa, Mekki, Biskri, Taganrog, Biada, Badri, Richi, Roussia and Souri were identified. Spike length ( H′  = 0.98), spike shape ( H′  = 0.86), grain size ( H′  = 0.94), grain shape ( H′  = 0.87) and grain color ( H′  = 0.86) were the most polymorphic morphological traits. The genetic diversity of these accessions was assessed using 10 simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers, with a polymorphic information content (PIC) of 0.69. Levels of genetic diversity were generally high ( I  = 0.62;  He  = 0.35). In addition, population structure analysis revealed 11 genetic groups, which were significantly correlated with the morphological characterization. Analysis of molecular variance (AMOVA) showed high genetic variation within regions (81%) and within genetic groups (41%), reflecting a considerable amount of admixture between landraces. The moderate (19%) and high (59%) levels of genetic variation detected among regions and among genetic groups, respectively, highlighted the selection practices of farmers. Furthermore, Mahmoudi accessions showed significant variation in spike density between central Tunisia (compact spikes) and southern Tunisia (loose spikes with open glume), may indicate an adaptation to high temperature in the south.    Conclusion  Overall, this study demonstrates the genetic richness of local durum wheat germplasm for better in situ and ex situ conservation and for the subsequent use of these accessions in wheat breeding programs.    Supplementary Information  The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12863-021-00958-3.

Morphological characterization and genetic diversity analysis of Tunisian durum wheat (Triticum turgidum var. durum) accessions