Evaluation of genetic diversity and relationships among tomato (Solanum lycopersicum mill.) genotypes using morphological and rapd markers

Genetic diversity was estimated with respect to nine morphological traits over sixteen tomato genotypes along with one check during Rabi season of 2008. Dendogram of D2 analysis grouped all the genotypes in seven clusters. All the nine characters contributed for diversity; wherein average fruit weight showed highest contribution (27.94%). Twenty RAPD primers produced 181 amplified products, among which 102 were polymorphic with 56.35% polymorphism. Among all tomato genotypes, similarity coefficient ranged from 0.74 to 0.99, indicating it as an important source of genetic diversity that can be exploited in future breeding programs. However, some of the genotypes which were diverse at morphological level, showed no diversity at molecular level, and vice-versa. Therefore, there is need to support morphological diversity with molecular diversity in selecting genotypes for breeding programme.