Characterization of genetic relationships of Rosa roxburghii Tratt and its relatives using morphological traits, RAPD and AFLP markers

Cili (Rosa roxburghii Tratt) is of great interest due to its high content of vitamin C, very high superoxide dismutase (SOD) activity, attractive senescence-retarding and cancer-preventing effects, together with immunity to rose blackspot disease. Thirty-six morphological traits, 251 RAPD markers amplified with 29 arbitrary primers, and 1685 AFLP markers generated from 54 primer combinations were employed to discriminate between 15 accessions, and to evaluate the relatedness of cili with a sample set of its relatives. The genotypes could be efficiently identified by genotype-specific RAPD or AFLP markers, yielded from the four most polymorphic primers: OPAN-07, OPB-11, OPAF-16 and OPW-02, or the six most polymorphic primer combinations: EA01/MC04, EA01/MC05, EA01/MC06, E02/MC01, EA05/MC04 and EA06/MC03, respectively. Compared with the relatives, very close relationships were found among the genotypes of cili. Furthermore, a high relatedness was strikingly obtained between R. sterilis S. D. Shi and R. hiveichowensis Yu and Ku with the three kinds of data. Using the Mantel correspondence test, significant correlations between the three kinds of data were observed, among which matrices of RAPD and AFLP were the most highly correlated: r = 0.7154 (P<0.01). Based on the assessments of the three kinds of data, multi-corolla cili and white-flower cili are certainly variants from R. roxburghii Tratt, while seedless cili presumably originates from a completely male-sterile strain of R. kweichonensis.