Molecular assessment of genetic divergence in pea genotypes using microsatellite markers

A study addressing to biochemical and molecular characterization of nineteen pea genotypes was conducted during rabi – 2012. Study on starch structure indicated that all the field pea genotypes showed simple grains, whereas all the vegetable pea genotypes had compound grains, which looked irregularly star- shaped, indicating the importance of starch structure to distinguish the vegetable pea from the field pea. Out of 26 primer pairs, 10 exhibited different levels of polymorphism amongst the nineteen pea genotypes. A total of fourty-eight allelic variants were detected among them with an average of 4.8 alleles per locus. Cluster analysis grouped all the nineteen genotypes into two broad clusters. The large range of similarity coefficient revealed by SSR markers provided greater confidence for the assessment of genetic divergence and interrelationship among the predicted two groups of field and vegetable peas. A perusal of similarity coefficients clearly reflected that a very high degree of similarity exists between pea genotypes VRP-9 and FP9-552, whereas FP9-557 and HBG found more diverse, may be used in breeding programme to generate the more recombinants.