Evaluation of genetic diversity in different genotypes of Gerbera jamesonii Bolus using random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) markers

Genetic diversity within Gerbera jamesonii Bolus is the key to genetic improvement of this important ornamental species. In the present study, genetic diversity of 12 accessions of gerbera was assessed through random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) markers. A total of 40 RAPD primers belonging to OPD, OPE, OPF and OPG series of universal primers set were used out of which, only 10 primers produced clear, reproducible and scorable bands. Ten (10) decamer RAPD primers produced a total of 49 scorable bands from 12 genotypes of G. jamesonii Bolus, out of which 42 were polymorphic and seven were monomorphic. The percentage of polymorphism ranged from a maximum of 100.00% by OPE-02, OPE-14, OPF-18, OPG-18, OPG-16 and OPG-17 to a minimum of 50.00% by OPE-08. The RAPD profiles generated were further evaluated for studying the Jaccard’s similarity coefficient. The average genetic similarity coefficient for the 12 accessions evaluated by Jaccard index was 0.66 ranging from 0.35 to 0.86. The RAPD amplification data were used to obtain similarity matrix and for generation of dendrogram using unweighted pair group method with arithmetic averages (UPGMA) method. Based on the dendrogram, all 12 genotypes could be distinctly divided into two clusters and the accession CF Orange was found most dissimilar from other accessions. This study shows that DNA based molecular marker RAPD is a powerful, less time consuming and cost effective molecular technique for assessment of genetic diversity among different genotypes of G. jamesonii Bolus. The availability of these gerbera RAPD markers would facilitate the use of molecular markers in gerbera breeding and genetic studies Keywords: Gerbera jamesonii Bolus, molecular markers, genetic diversity, RAPD African Journal of Biotechnology , Vol. 13(10), pp. 1117-1122, 5 March, 2014