Metabolic Fingerprinting of Citrus Cultivars and Related Genera Using HPLC and Multivariate Analysis

Citrus taxonomy is very complex and confusing, because of asexual reproduction and sexual compatibility between Citrus and related genera. Metabolic diversity was studied in Citrus, Poncirus and Fortunella cultivars by the high performance liquid chromatography technique combined with multivariate statistical analysis. Chromatograms obtained from cultivars of the same species showed similar elution profiles. These results suggested that metabolic profiles carry characteristics of hybrid origin. To confirm the similarities among the Citrus species and their cultivars, multivariate statistical analysis was applied to the chromatograms. According to hierarchical cluster analysis, all cultivars used in this study were divided into three major groups, which largely correspond to pummelo, mandarin and lemon. Hybrids were clustered together with their hybrid origin or their related cultivars. Our results indicated that the metabolic fingerprinting method provides an insight into the phylogenic relationships among Citrus species and cultivars.