Evaluation of Potato Cultivars Grown in Saudi Arabia by Morphological Characters and RAPD Markers

Genetic diversity of 10 potato cultivars was investigated at the DNA level with the random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) procedure and at the phenotypic level using morphological characters. The results indicated that there were considerable variations among the different studied cultivars. Cultivars Victoria, Frizia and Safaren had the highest chlorophyll content compared to the other cultivars in both seasons. The largest leaf area and leaf dry weight were measured in cultivar Safaren and Mondial in both seasons. Cultivars Aboulx and Mondia produced the highest tuber yield in both seasons. On the other hand, cultivars Victoria and Edward were characterized by their considerably lower yield than other studied cultivars. Specific gravity varied considerably among the different potato cultivars. Thirteen random decamer primers were used to amplify DNA via the polymerase chain reaction and 75 RAPDs were generated. The RAPD profiles obtained were successfully used to differentiate potato cultivars. Based on the pair-wise comparison of amplification products, genetic similarity was estimated. The genetic similarity among all potato cultivars ranged from 50 to 92 %. Cultivars Victoria and Etfadoal presented the least similarity (0.50) while cultivars Mondial and Citrix had the greatest similarity (0.92). Etfadoal cultivar displayed the greatest genetic diversity of all cultivars. A dendrogram was constructed using UPGMA analysis. On the basis of this analysis, the cultivars were grouped into three clusters. The polymorphism detected suggests that RAPD markers are reliable for identification of potato cultivars and could be exploited in genetic mapping of populations to tag economically important traits.