Genetic variability among local apricots (Prunus armeniaca L.) from the Southeast of Spain

The fast rotation of new cultivars demanded by modern fruit growers implies the loss of many old varieties with valuable characters. Then, the need arises to keep and characterize this germplasm for future breeding projects. The region of Murcia, together with Valencia, in the East and Southeast of Spain respectively, are important and ancient producers of apricot (Prunus armeniaca L.), and many local cultivars have appeared and diversified in this area. A collection of 28 of these old cultivars, plus eight clonal selections of the cultivar ‘Búlida’, is maintained at the Instituto Murciano de Investigación y Desarrollo Agrario y Alimentario (IMIDA, Murcia, Spain). In order to characterize their genetic diversity and to identify the collection with molecular markers, 17 microsatellite primers pairs were used. Thirteen of these primers produced polymorphic repeatable amplification patterns, and 31 genotypes were identified among the 36 apricot accessions. In addition to this, an evaluation of the genetic diversity found in the field within the cultivar ‘Búlida ’ was made, the predominant cultivar for the canning industry in the region. For this, 66 f ield samples were analyzed with seven microsatellite markers. The results suggest that all the samples could derive from four closely-related genotypes, one of them accounting for 89 % of the samples. Additional key words: cultivar identification, genetic relationships, microsatellites, molecular diversity, molecu-lar markers