Genetic diversity of wild and cultivated grapevine accessions from southeast Turkey

Wild grapevine genetic diversity in southeast Turkey has not been documented to date. In the present work, in order to clarify the relationships between wild and cultivated grape accessions from southeastern Turkey, 22 nuclear and three chloroplast microsatellite loci were used on 21 wild grapevine Vitis vinifera L. ssp. sylvestris (Gmelin) and 13 cultivated grapevine Vitis vinifera ssp. sativa accessions. The number of alleles per SSR locus ranged from 4 (VVIn16) to 20 (VVIv67) and the mean allele number per locus was 10.09. Expected locus heterozygosity ranged from 0.586 (locus VVIb01) to 0.898 (locus (VVIv67)). The three cpSSR molecular markers presented variation in size both in cultivars and in wild Turkish accessions. Two size variants were detected for cpSSR3 (106 and 107 bp) for cpSSR5 (104 and 105 bp), and for cpSSR10 (115 and 116 bp). The six alleles in wild grapevines fell into three haplotypes B, C and D. A genetic structure according to accessions taxonomic status (wild or cultivated) was revealed by UPGMA analysis. This highlighted a clear separation between domesticated and wild accessions in Turkish germplasm. The results pointed out the need to further collect and characterize this wild and cultivated grapevine germplasm.