Development of SSR markers and their application to genetic diversity analysis of Curcuma alismatifolia varieties

Background: Curcuma alismatifolia is an ornamental cultivar with several varieties introduced into China from Thailand within the past fifteen years. Curcuma alismatifolia is widely used as cut flowers and potted flowers and is also used in flower beds. Questions and/or Hypotheses: However, limited genetic and genomic information is available for this species, which has impeded studies on the enhancement of its ornamental value and stress resistance. Studied species Curcuma alismatifolia Study site and dates: Zhejiang, 2018 Methods: single-cell sequencing technology of PCR and polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis Results: (A/T)n accounted for 43.6 % of the SSRs, the maximum proportion, and mononucleotide and trinucleotide repeats were the two most abundant repeat types. A total of 3,637 primer pairs flanking SSR sequences were successfully designed, and 70 sets of primers were randomly selected for validation in 10 varieties. Forty-one (59 %) of the 70 primer pairs successfully amplified alleles, of which 35 were identified as polymorphic markers and used to assess the level of genetic diversity and genetic relationships among the 10 varieties. The genetic diversity analysis showed that the number of alleles (Na) at each locus ranged from 2 to 8, with an average of 3.97, and that PIC had a mean of 0.524 and ranged from 0.095 to 0.795. Conclusions: The genetic distance between 10 varieties varied from 0.30 to 0.96, and the dendrogram clustered all varieties into three groups.