Characterization of Wild Apricot (Prunus armeniaca L.) Genotypes Selected from Cappadocia Region (Nevşehir-Turkey) by SSR Markers

Abstract

Cappadocia region of Anatolia hosts the third largest wild apricot population in Turkey. The objective of the study was  to characterize 44 wild apricot genotypes selected from Cappadocia Region (Nevsehir-Turkey) as prominent with their  late flowering, resistance to spring late frosts, large fruit sizes and/or late fruit ripening characteristics and 5 reference  apricot cultivars (‘Hacihaliloglu’, ‘Kabaasi’, ‘Hasanbey’, ‘Aprikoz’ and ‘Levent’) with SSR (simple sequence repeats)  markers. A total of 16 SSR primers were used and 13 of them were successfully amplified. Total number of alleles was 107, average number of alleles was 8.23; average He and Ho values were 0.722 and 0.669, respectively. Polymorphism  information content (PIC) values varied between 0.471 and 0.845. There was a quite high genetic diversity among wild  apricot genotypes that genetic similarity values varied between 12 and 96%. Homonymous and synonymous genotypes  were not encountered.