DNA Barcoding of Polygalaceae

Polygalaceae is a large family with a cosmopolitan distribution, comprising ca. 1,200 species in 27 genera. However, similar to many plant groups, the identification of Polygalaceae species mostly depends on floral and fruit characteristics; therefore, DNA barcoding could easily warrant the corect identification of sterile material. In the current study, the utility of six widely employed plant DNA barcode loci, namely rbcL, matK, trnL-F region (including trnL intron+trnL-F intergenic spacer), the entire ITS (ITS1+5.8S+ITS2) as well as subunits ITS1 and ITS2 have been explored by performing Maximum Likelihood (ML) and TaxonDNA analyses. The results have shown that, while none of the six loci reviewed here completely fulfils the ideal DNA barcoding criteria; yet, matK region is the most useful DNA barcode for Polygalaceae.