Genetic diversity of some potato varieties using ISSR technic

Abstract

The genetic diversity between ten potato varieties imported and cultivated in Syria was studied for using these varieties in the development of effective breeding programs of potato. 16 ISSR primers were used, all the used primers led to the amplification of DNA fragments for all the studied varieties, the total number of bands resulting by all the used primers was 432 bands, with an average of 27 bands per primer. All the bands resulting from most primers were polymorphic, the total number of polymorphic bands was 426 with an average of 26.63 bands per primer, while the total number of monomorphic bands was 6 bands only. The average of polymorphism percentages for the used primers was 97.95 %, and it was 100 % for 12 primers. The most genetically closer varieties were Tebina and Amarin, while the most distant varieties were Tebina and Spunta. The cluster analysis divided the studied varieties into three groups. The first group included four varieties: Electra, Amarin, Tebina and Loane; the second group included Safari only, and the third group included five varieties: Ambition, Spunta, Diamante, Triplo and Sifra. These results indicate that the ISSR is an effective tool to determine the genetic diversity between the different potato genotypes, and the high genetic diversity between the studied varieties indicate also the possibility of use of these varieties in the potato genetic improvement programs.