Genetic diversity estimates in Cicer using AFLP analysis

Amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) analysis was used to evaluate the genetic variation among cultivated chickpea and wild Cicer relatives. In total, 214 marker loci were assessed, of which 211 were polymorphic (98.6%) across the 95 accessions that represented 17 species of Cicer. The genetic variation within a species was highest in C. pinnatifidum followed by C. reticulatum and lowest in C. macracanthum. Three main species groups were identified by UPGMA clustering using Nei's pair-wise distance calculations. Group I included the cultivated species C. arietinum, C. reticulatum and C. echinospermum. Within this group, C. reticulatum accessions were clustered closest to the C. arietinum cultivars 'Lasseter', 'Kaniva' and 'Bumper', supporting the hypothesis that C. reticulatum is the most probable progenitor of the cultivated species. Cicer bijugum, C. judaicum and C. pinnatifidum were clustered together creating group II. Group III contained all nine perennial species assessed and two annual species C. yamashitae and C. cuneatum. The genetic distance detected between group I and group III (0.13) was equivalent to the genetic distance detected between group I and group II (the primary and annual tertiary species, respectively; 0.14). This indicated that the perennial tertiary species may be as valuable for increasing variation to incorporate novel germplasm in the cultigen as the annual tertiary species.