Morphological-, chemical- and RAPD-PCR evaluation of eight different Ocimum basilicum L. gene bank accessions

Abstract In our study eight different Ocimum basilicum L. gene bank accessions were characterized by morphological evaluation, essential oil composition and RAPD molecular markers. Morphological traits were described using the standardized descriptor list of UPOV. The composition of the essential oil distilled from dried leaves was determined by gas chromatography/mass spectrometry (GC–MS). Fresh young leaves were used to extract genomic DNA for the RAPD-PCR evaluation. From the morphological aspects two groups could be distinguished with the method of cluster analysis. From the chemical aspect two different chemical types can be distinguished, according to the main components. The first one is a linalool type (‘Arvada’, ‘Dark Opal’, ‘Genovese’, ‘Lengyel’, ‘Rit-Sat’) and the second one is a linalool–methyl chavicol type (‘A-1’, Mittelgroβblattriger Grunes’, ‘Piros’). Based on RAPD-PCR analysis the accessions formed two clusters. The purple-leaved accessions (‘Piros’, ‘Dark Opal’) were located in group A, and the remaining ones (‘Genovese’, ‘Arvada’, ‘Lengyel’, ‘Rit-Sat’, ‘Mittelgroβblattriger Grunes’, ‘A-1′) were classified into group B. ‘Rit-Sat’ and ‘Genovese’ were not separated, based on their band pattern. It is shown by the result of the morphological, chemical and RAPD-PCR analysis that the data obtained by different methods not necessarily correlated with each other, except the accessions of ‘Genovese’ and ‘Dark Opal’, in which cases all characteristics show a good distinction. We observed that the cultivar ‘Genovese’ and the ‘Rit-Sat’ accession represent quite similar quality and the ‘Arvada’ accession of American origin is not really separated from the European ones by the complex evaluation.