DIFFERENTIATION OF CHICKPEA ACCESIONS WITH MORPHOLOGICAL AND MOLECULAR CHARACTERS

Abstract

Chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) is one of the main grain legumes grown in the world. Mexico is among the top ten producers worldwide with a total production of 171 thousand tons of grain. This crop presents a high level of autogamy and of genetic evenness, which makes the differentiation of elite genotypes difficult. In this preliminary study, the variability of 57 genotypes from different geographic areas was evaluated using morphological characters and molecular markers such as RAPD and ISSR. Multiple correspondence analysis showed that the highest discriminating values were those of blue flower color and large seeds of rounded shape, but the respective grouping did not differentiate accessions, including wild species; however, UPGMA analysis achieved a better separation. RAPD markers, even when they generated DNA profiles, were not informative, while ISSR differentiated the 57 accessions of C.arietinum and the wild species C. reticulatum, which makes them good candidates to characterize this crop. This study served as a basis to develop another more efficient molecular marker system in this species.