Comparative assessment of genetic diversity among Indian bamboo genotypes using RAPD and ISSR markers

Bamboo is one of the important plant for pulp, paper and charcoal industries. After China, India is the second largest bamboo reserve in Asia. Around the globe, wide genetic diversity of bamboo is present which serves as the base for selection and improvement. DNA based molecular markers appears to be a striking substitute for systematic assessment of the genetic diversity in conservation and genetic improvement of plants. DNA based molecular markers such as RAPD and ISSR were used to assess the genetic diversity in 13 bamboo genotypes. Total 120 RAPD and 63 ISSR primers were tested, of which only 42 polymorphic primers (30 RAPD and 12 ISSR), gave reproducible amplification profile and were used in this study. 30 RAPD primers yielded total 645 amplified fragments, of which 623 were polymorphic, and 20.76 polymorphic bands per primer were observed across 13 genotypes. 12 ISSR primers produced 246 amplified fragments, of which 241 were polymorphic, and 20.08 polymorphic bands per primer was observed across 13 different genotypes. The Jaccard's coefficient of RAPD, ISSR and pooled RAPD and ISSR dendrograms ranged from 0.26 to 0.83, 0.23 to 0.86 and 0.26 to 0.84 respectively. The present study found the large genetic diversity present between different elite genotypes of bamboo. Such investigation can deliver a well understanding of the available genotypes, which might be further exploited for the paper industry.