Genetic diversity studies of Brazilian garlic cultivars and quality control of garlic-clover production

ABSTRACT. The garlic cultivars grown in Brazil evolved from so-matic mutations and clone selection by breeding programs and by the introduction of germplasm from other countries. Morphological characters have been used to differentiate these cultivars. Two hun-dred and six random amplified polymorphic DNA markers were uti-lized for a diversity analysis of the 17 most planted garlic cultivars in Brazil. Bootstrap analysis showed that the number of markers was efficient and sufficient to obtain a coefficient of variation of 10%. Similarity varied between 16 and 98 % and cluster analysis showed that, in general, genetic similarities correlate with morphological characters of the cultivars and production cycle variation. High boot-strap values at most of the nodes supported the dendrogram stability. The grouping of most varieties agreed well with previous reports 535 ©FUNPEC-RP www.funpecrp.com.brGenetics and Molecular Research 7 (2): 534-541 (2008