Molecular Characterization and Genetic Diversity of Schleichera oleosa (Lour.) Oken: Major Host Tree for Lac Cultivation

Schleichera oleosa (Lour.) Oken (a monotypic genus), belonging to family Sapindaceae, has been reported for its medicinal importance as well as its extensive use for lac cultivation in the Indo-Chinese subcontinent. Lac, secreted by females of lac insect Kerria lacca (Kerr), has tremendous industrial applications. Thirty-seven good, bad and intermediate lac yielding trees of S. oleosa were selected for molecular characterization using RAPD markers. Twenty-one random decamer primers revealed 81.4 % average polymorphism among selected trees. The Jaccard’s similarity coefficient value was 0.617, indicating very high genetic diversity between these trees. No strong grouping was observed among good and bad lac yielders while most of the intermediate lac yielders grouped together in UPGMA and PCA analysis. Genetic diversity indices were lowest in intermediate lac yielders while comparable in good and bad lac yielders. The low genetic differentiation (F st ) and gene flow (Nm) was estimated among good and bad yielding populations. On the other hand, high genetic differentiation and restricted gene flow was estimated among good and intermediate as well as among bad and intermediate yielder populations. The unique DNA profile of each trees suggests that trees of S. oleosa under the use of lac cultivation were seed propagated rather than via any vegetative mode of propagation. This study would also be helpful in future for their true to type multiplication through tissue culture and breeding programs for elite trees.