Genetic diversity of red clover cultivars (Trifolium pratense L.) based on protein polimorphism

Abstract

Red clover is the second most important perennial forage legume. Based on morphological characters alone, it is difficult to distinguish accessories of red clover from each other because they have overlapping variations in terms of the major delimiting morphological and biological characters. The aim of this study was to analyze the genetic relationships of 32 red clover cultivars collected from European gene banks, as well as created in Serbia, based on seed storage proteins and isozymes. From 8 analyzed enzymic systems, there were no differences in zymograms for six enzymes only two enzymes were polymorphic. Two different allelic variants were found for enzyme shikimate dehydrogenase and three for phosphohexose isomeraze. The seed proteins in the area of higher molecular high weight, 55-95 kDa, were identified as polimorphic. All the cultivars were placed into three clusters on the basis of Ward's distance range. The cluster pattern showed correlation between genetic diversity and geographic origin. Genetic distance between cultivars based on protein fingerprint could be used as a tool to control and protect intellectual property right over plant breeding material.