Genetic Diversity Analysis in Grasspea (Lathyrus sativus L.) Using SSR Molecular Markers

The study of genetic diversity among Lathyrus sativus L. may give fundamental insights into extent of genetic variation and provide options to meet the climate change challenge. 20 SSR loci were employed to assess the genetic diversity of 32 grasspea genotypes. Eleven markers proved to be polymorphic across examined genotypes in aggregation to allow detection of a total of 21 alleles with an average of 1.91 alleles per locus. The polymorphism information content (PIC) calculated as a relative measure of informativeness for each of the SSR markers, ranged from 0.11 to 0.34. The dendrogram from the neighbour-joining UPGMA cluster analysis of the pair-wise simple matching dissimilarity coefficients matrix grouped genotypes into three main clusters. Therefore the characters contributing maximum to genetic diversity may be given importance during grasspea hybridization program and these genotypes may be utilized in further grasspea breeding program aimed to enhance grain yield.