Fruit Quality Traits and Genotypic Characterization in a Pomegranate Ex Situ ( Punica granatum L.) Collection in Greece

Lefkothea Karapetsi, Georgios Pantelidis, Emmanouil D. Pratsinakis, Pavlina Drogoudi and Panagiotis Madesis
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Lefkothea Karapetsi: Institute of Applied Biosciences (INAB), CERTH, 6th Km Charilaou-Thermi Road, 57001 Thessaloniki, Greece
Georgios Pantelidis: Department of Deciduous Fruit Trees, Institute of Plant Breeding and Genetic Resources, Hellenic Agricultural Organization ‘Demeter’, 38 R.R. Station, 59035 Naoussa, Greece
Emmanouil D. Pratsinakis: Laboratory of Agronomy, School of Agriculture, Faculty of Agriculture, Forestry and Natural Environment, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, 54124 Thessaloniki, Greece
Pavlina Drogoudi: Department of Deciduous Fruit Trees, Institute of Plant Breeding and Genetic Resources, Hellenic Agricultural Organization ‘Demeter’, 38 R.R. Station, 59035 Naoussa, Greece
Panagiotis Madesis: Institute of Applied Biosciences (INAB), CERTH, 6th Km Charilaou-Thermi Road, 57001 Thessaloniki, Greece

Agriculture, 2021, vol. 11, issue 6, 1-21

Abstract: Pomegranate is one of the oldest known fruit crops, well adapted to hot and dry areas and successfully grown in Mediterranean countries. During the last two decades, numerous publications have revealed the traditionally known associations between pomegranate consumption and health benefits, which led to increased demand by consumers and expansion in cultivation areas. Pomegranate is well adapted to areas with diverse pedoclimatic conditions and local cultivars could provide an essential source of genes for breeding. In this study, fruit phenotypic and genetic variability, and relationships, were studied in 26 Greek and foreign pomegranate cultivars/accessions grown in an ex situ collection located in Naoussa Greece, using Inter Simple Sequence Repeat (ISSR) and Start Codon Targeted (SCoT) molecular markers. Results from the principal component analysis made on fruit phenotypic characters revealed five components that accounted for 74.8% of the total variance, the first being related to skin color parameters and the second to juice antioxidant contents and aril color. Clustering from phenotypic data allocated individuals into four clusters. A total of 184 bands were generated for all markers applied across the 26 pomegranate cultivars/accessions, with an average of 77 bands per ISSR markers and 82 bands for SCoT markers. Low variability in the phenotypic and genotypic level was indicated; nevertheless, results from the association study between phenotypic traits and molecular markers that were obtained using Multiple Regression Analysis (MRA) could prove valuable for marker-assisted breeding programs, especially from SCoT markers that were found to be strongly or averagely associated with the morphological traits and chemical components.

Keywords: antioxidants; ISSR; MRA; phenotypic traits; SCoT; traits-markers association study (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q1 Q10 Q11 Q12 Q13 Q14 Q15 Q16 Q17 Q18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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