Polymorphism of some native Sistan grapes assessed by long and short primers for RAPD markers

Grapevines have Bronze ages archive in Sistan area of Iran. In order to study the genetic variation and taxonomic relationships between 6 cultivars of the Sistan grapevines (Vitis vinifera L.) at molecular level, random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) markers were used. The data were subjected to statistical analyses and genetic resemblance was calculated using Dice similarity index. The grapevines related to the different geographic areas of Sistan were assessed by 50 short (10 mer) and long (15-21 mer) primers. Out of 50 primers which were tested, 21 primers gave reproducible results. Selected primers created 497 bands. Resulting profiles showed that the produced bands varied in size from 300 to 3500 base pairs. The numbers of reliable polymorphic fragments for short and long primers were 86 and 334 bands, respectively. In multiplication reaction the items in the size area of 564 to 1904 base pair resulted for short primers and 564 to 4277 base pair for long primers. From the bands calculated a matrix that was analyzed by the unweighted pair group method on arithmetic averages to draw a dendrogram. The population was classified in 4 main groups in which Red Yaghooti and White Yaghooti had the maximum and Red Yaghooti and Laal had the minimum similarity coefficients. In our study, by comparing the results gained from technique long and short primers in RAPD, the potential value of long primers for the production of polymorphism in grapes was identified. © 2007 Asian Network for Scientific Information.