Diversity and relationships of Miscanthus sinensis from 20 geographical distributions in China based on SSR markers

Miscanthus is a C4 herbaceous perennial species and it was chosen as a bioenergy crop due to high biomass yield. Miscanthus sinensis has many phenotypes which are adaptated to various environments in China. In this study, 421 accessions of M. sinensis were collected from 22 provinces, and the genetic polymorphisms amongst these germplasm collections were identified using 20 primer pairs designed against 10 each from eSSR and gSSR transferable markers from barley. A total of 95 SSR loci were detected producing a 100% polymorphic rate among these M. sinensis accessions. The gSSR markers showed a richer genetic polymorphism than eSSR markers. Based on the UPGMA clustering, there was a distinct sub-population separation in M. sinensis, which indicates that geographical differences and natural selection are the driving forces for genetic variation and evolution in the species. The 20 pairs of barley markers matched to 26 loci associated with date of heading, plant height, leaf weight, stem weight, leaf/stem ratio, and total biomass yield. Eleven marker loci were associated with the date of heading, 4 with plant height, 10 with leaf weight, 7 with stem weight, 3 with leaf/stem ratio, and 10 with biomass yield.The accepted manuscript in pdf format is listed with the files at the bottom of this page. The presentation of the authors' names and (or) special characters in the title of the manuscript may differ slightly between what is listed on this page and what is listed in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript; that in the pdf file of the accepted manuscript is what was submitted by the author