Td-DAMD-PCR assays for fngerprinting of commercial carnations

Abstract

Dianthus L. is one of the highly valued plant species in the family Caryophyllaceae. More than 30,000 cultivars of commercialcarnations have been recorded and there is a need for an efective and cheap method to reveal their genetic diversity and identify thecultivars. To the best of our knowledge this is the frst report of implementation of the touchdown direct amplifcation of minisatellite- region DNA polymerase chain reaction (Td-DAMD-PCR) technique in the genus Dianthus. A total of 12 core minisatellite primersempirically selected from 22 primers were used in fngerprinting and phylogenetic studies of some commercial carnation cultivars.Analysis revealed that commercial carnations have a wide genetic base and they were probably obtained using inter-crosses betweenand among diferent species of the genus Dianthus. A total of 17 DNA markers were variety specifc and most of the remaining markersobtained in the present study were useful in fngerprinting of the commercial varieties studied. Commercial varieties were diferentiatedin spray and standard carnation groups in a principal coordinate analysis and a Bayesian 50% majority-rule consensus tree. Td- DAMD-PCR markers reported in this study could be very useful in species identifcation, determination of genetic relationships, andphylogenetic studies of species of Dianthus.