Investigation of genetic diversity of some Medicago sativa from west and  northwestern of Iran using microsatellite markers

Mohammadi, Rahmat; Aali-amiri, Reza; Naghavi, Moammad-reza; Kaboli, Mohammad-mehdi

Investigation of genetic diversity of some Medicago sativa from west and northwestern of Iran using microsatellite markers

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

Abstract

Alfalfa is one of the most important forage crops in the world. The west and northwest parts of Iran are the important regions for Alfalfa planting. Because few studies are available on the genetic diversity of this crop in the regions, therefore, the objective of this study was to determine the genetic diversity in 34 populations of alfalfa from west and northwest of Iran. These were analyzed using 10 microsatellite markers. Totally, 51 bands were obtained from which 45 bands were polymorphic corresponding to an average of 5 alleles per locus. The percentage of polymorphism with an average of 0.55 varied from 0.29 for MAL369471 to .8 for ENOD20 and also for MI with an average of 2.1 from 0.29 for MAL369471 to 4.01 for ENOD20. Chaharmahal va Bakhtiari province had maximum of both gene diversity and Shannon's Information index (He=0.19, I=0.29), while the minimum amounts (He=0.13, I=0.13) were obtained in Tehran province. Dendrogram constructed based on dissimilarity matrix grouped populations in two main groups; the first group belongs to populations from Karaj, while in the other populations were located in second group. The result showed that microsatellite markers are effective tools for evaluation genetic diversity in Iranian alfalfa populations. The results of this study provided useful information for the future collection and for the of genetic resource management in the regions.

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