Genetic Diversity Assessment of Ancient Tea Plants in Yunnan Province of China Revealed by EST-SSR Markers

The genetic diversity and relationship of 39 ancient tea varieties gathered in different areas in Yunnan were analyzed by EST-SSR markers. The results showed that total 121 alleles were amplified,and effective number of alleles was 73. 88%. The polymorphism information content( PIC) was ranging from 0. 05 to 0. 74 with the average of 0. 469. The average genetic diversity and the average Shannon's information index were 0. 55 and 0. 81 respectively,which was higher than 0. 5. The Nei's original measures of genetic identity among those tea germplasms ranged from 0. 441 to 0. 907,with average of 0. 653,and this results indicated that the genetic basis among those tea germplasms was wide,and the level of genetic diversity within those ancient tea varieties was high. The cluster analysis based on SSR markers revealed that the genetic distance and the genetic relationship within most of those varieties were related by its geographic source. The genetic relationship of all 39 ancient tea plants revealed by SSR dendrogram would be greatly helpful for the protection and utilization research on wild ancient tea varieties in the future.