We used inter-simple sequence repeat (ISSR) markers to investigate genetic variation in eight natural populations of Elephantopus scaber from South China, including Guangdong, Hainan and Hong Kong. Eleven primers produced 247 bands across all 184 individuals, of which 243 (98.4%) were polymorphic. The average genetic diversity at the species and population levels was estimated to be 0.283 and 0.103, respectively, using mean expected heterozygosity. The average gene differentiation (F ST ) among populations was 0.725. AMOVA analysis showed that the partition of molecular variation between and within populations was 72.5% and 27.5%, respectively. The effective number of migrants among populations based on the F ST was relatively low (N m ¼ 0.095). Cluster analysis based on Nei's genetic distance and the neighbour-joining method revealed the genetic relationships among the populations of E. scaber. The Mantel test indicated that there was no significant correlation between population genetic and geographic distances. The results obtained from the AMOVA analysis, the cluster analysis, and the Mantel test all suggested that fragmented local environments and human disturbance might play important roles in shaping the population structure of E. scaber.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.