Assessment of genetic diversity in Shorea robusta: an economically important tropical tree species

Abstract

The present investigation reports an elucidation of genetic diversity among four-populations of most economically and ecologically important tree species, sal (Shorea robusta Gaertn.) for the first time in India, using ISSR markers. A total of one-hundred individual S. robusta trees were sampled from four different populations, considering twenty-five individuals from each population. In total, twenty-ISSR primers were screened with S. robusta DNA, and out of twenty, sixteen-primer produced reproducible amplicons. Sixteen selected ISSR markers were amplified a total of 118 alleles and the total number of amplicons for individual primers ranged from 5 to 12, with a mean of 7.37 alleles per primer, of which 74 were polymorphic with an average of 4.62 alleles per primer. The ISSR primer (GA)8YG yielded highest number of alleles (12) A dendrogram based on UPGMA analysis grouped the four populations into two major clusters, having Keonjhar population into first cluster and rest three populations into second cluster. It was notable that the second major cluster was further divided into three-separate sub-clusters, representing population from each three locations. Analysis of molecular variance (AMOVA) revealed that the majority of genetic variation exists within populations, compared to the variation that exists among the populations. The present study is a clear-cut indication that inter-and intra-population genetic variation exists in S. robusta and ISSRs appears to be an efficient marker system in quantifying genetic variability in different populations of S. robusta.

Genome-wide characterization leading to simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers development in Shorea robusta

“…The key measures of the genetic diversity are observed ( H o ) and expected heterozygosity ( H e ) (Sherif and Alemayehu 2018 ), where H e is considered as a most suitable measure for characterizing marker loci among the different genotypes of a species (Monfared et al 2018 ; Xue et al 2018 ). To this date, works on genetic analysis in S. robusta were conducted using isozymes and ISSR markers in Nepal and India, respectively (Suoheimo et al 1999 ; Surabhi et al 2017 ). Moreover, few microsatellite studies have also been conducted on this species (Pandey and Geburek 2009 , 2010 , 2011 ).…”

“…Yet, to date, very few researches have explored the genetic diversity and population structure in natural populations of S. robusta . Previous studies analyzed genetic diversity of S. robusta based on isozyme and Inter Simple Sequence Repeats (ISSR) markers (Suoheimo et al 1999 ; Surabhi et al 2017 ). However, an overview of the genetic and population structure is presently not available for this premier timber resource in subcontinents, and only limited information could be extracted due to the scarcity of markers.…”

Optimisation of Genomic DNA Extraction and PCR Procedure for Sal (Shorea robusta)

“…Sal is one of the most important timber species and belongs to the family Dipterocarpaceae. As a perennial and long-lived tree species, shows higher genetic diversity within the population than among populations (Surabhi et al 2017). Pandey and Geburek (2011) reported a good amount of genetic variability present in natural populations of Sal, which may be due to continuous gene flow among the populations as evidenced by population genetic structure studies.…”