Determination of genetic variation and relationship in Thymus vulgaris populations in Syria by random RAPD markers

Abstract

In order to detect the genetic variation and relationship among Thymus vulgaris populations collected from five different provinces in Syria, Random Amplified Polymorphic DNA (RAPD) analysis was applied. A total of 198 bands were obtained using 27 primers. Polymorphism was 90.91% while the polymorphism of the total bands was 78.73%, which indicated a close relationship among some populations. Populations of T. vulgaris were characterized by 37 unique bands of which eight were negative. Dendrogram based on Percent of Disagreement Values (PDV) matrix revealed two major sub-clusters in which the populations from different geographic locations constituted distinct groups. The highest similarity degree was more than 90% among populations from Suwayda. These findings indicated a significant relationship between the studied populations and their geographic locations.

Keywords:

• Genetic relationship
• genetic variation
• geographic location
• PDV matrix
• RAPD
• Thymus vulgaris

Acknowledgement

Miss Rasha Khalil was supported by a scholarship from the China Scholarship Council.