Brazil is the largest sugarcane producer in the world and, the main varieties grown in Brazil, known as RB cultivars, were developed by the Interinstitutional Network for the Development of the Sugar and Alcohol Sector (RIDESA) and are used in 58.9% of the planted area in Brazil. These varieties were obtained through intercrosses between genotypes from the Serra do Ouro germplasm bank and successive crosses with related genotypes may have increased the level of genetic similarity. The aim of the present study was to analyze the genetic base of the Serra do Ouro germplasm bank over the past decades using microsatellite molecular markers. The genetic similarity among varieties using all the markers ranged from 0.166 to 0.823, and regression analysis showed an increase in genetic similarity in the 1970s; however, a narrowing of the genetic base over the last five decades was not observed.
The aim of this study was to analyze the expression of putative reference genes in sugarcane under drought stress. The varieties RB72454 and RB72910 were cultivated and the treatments control and drought stress applied to 135-day-old plants grown under field conditions. The stress level of the plants was measured by rate of photosynthesis, transpiration, and stomatal conductance. For each biological replicate, expression analyses were conducted using quantitative polymerase chain reaction for the genes α-tubulin, β-tubulin, β-actin, cyclophilin, eukaryotic elongation factor 1, glyceraldehyde 3-phosphate dehydrogenase (GAPDH), histone H3 and ubiquitin. Stability was evaluated using the geNorm, NormFinder, and BestKeeper software packages. Among the candidate genes, GAPDH was identified as the most stable in all software, indicating its suitability for gene expression studies in sugarcane undergoing drought stress; the gene β-actin was the second most stable. These findings suggest using GAPDH and β-actin for normalization in relative gene expression in sugarcane.
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