Morpho-Biochemical and Molecular Characterization of Basmati Rice Germplasm

Abstract

Rice (Oryza sativa L.), the second most widely consumed cereal grain after wheat, is a member of the Gramineae family (Poaceae). The study of genetic diversity among twenty basmati rice varieties from S.V.P.U.A &T., Meerut was carried out through morphological, biochemical parameters and molecular markers. For morphological characterization, growth parameters viz., plant height, spike length, number of grains per plant, number of tillers per plant were selected where, Basmati-386 has the highest plant height, CSR-30 have maximum spike length, Basmati-1612 have maximum number of grains and Punjab Basmati-4 have maximum number of tillers. For biochemical characterization, total seed protein of varieties was subjected to protein profiling through SDS-PAGE and on the basis of number of polymorphic bands Vallabh Basmati-21 and Tarawadi Basmati were found to be highly polymorphic and clustered into the Cluster I. A total of ten SSR markers used, of which seven primers produced results with eight Basmati varieties. Seven SSR primers amplified a total of 52 reproducible band positions, of which 51 were polymorphic. The number of alleles produced by SSR primers ranged from two (RM-122 and RM-127) to four (RM-3), with a mean of 2.714 alleles per locus. The primer RM-23 produced the maximum number of polymorphic bands (12 bands), PIC values ranged from 0.1875 (RM-1) to 0.4791 (RM-23) with an average of 2.40, and the maximum resolving power (RP) of SSR markers was 2.5 by SSR RM-23 and the lowest was 0.25 by SSR RM-127 with an average value of 1.178. The average number of polymorphic bands per primer was 5.714; the PIC values ranged from 0.1875 (RM-1) to 0.4791 (RM-23) with an average. By the genetic diversity study performance of different basmati rice varieties in rice growing areas can be evaluated, genetic diversity among the aromatic rice varieties can be determined, genetic divergence of the aromatic rice varieties can be evaluated using microsatellite (SSR) markers and for future aromatic rice breeding program superior basmati variety among the germplasm can be identified.