553 Genetic Diversity in Papua New Guinea Sweetpotato Germplasm

The USDA gene bank currently maintains 668 accessions of cultivated sweetpotato and 219 accessions of related Ipomoea species. Information on the genetic diversity of the collection does not exist due to funding constraints. The development of a core collection would provide a subset of accessions that represent the genetic diversity of the main collection with a minimum of repetitiveness. The small size of the core collection would facilitate the evaluation of the accessions for economically important traits. The objective of this research is to develop a core collection of Papua New Guinea sweetpotato germplasm using the Amplified Fragment Length Polymorphisms (AFLPs) marker system. This approach to quantifying genetic diversity would later serve as a model for the development of a USDA sweetpotato germplasm core collection. The germplasm choosen for this study was collected from this crop's secondary center of genetic diversity based on its potential as a source of new traits. All genotypes were fingerprinted using four primer combinations that generated 224 markers. The molecular data was then analyzed using NTSYSpc 2.0 program to determine the relatedness of the genotypes. The molecular analysis showed a homogeneous genetic constitution. The extent of diversity among accessions was correlated with the geographic origin of the plant material.