Assessment of natural DNA methylation variation and its association with economically important traits in dolichos...

As a prelude to exploit DNA methylation-induced variation, we hypothesized the existence of substantial natural DNA methylation variation and its association with economically important traits in dolichos bean, and tested it using amplified methylation polymorphism-polymerase chain reaction (AMP-PCR) assay. DNA methylation patterns such as internal, external, full and non-methylation were amplified in a set of 64 genotypes using 26 customized randomly amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) primers containing 5'CCGG3' sequence. The 64 genotypes included 60 germplasm accessions (GA), two advanced breeding lines (ABLs) and two released varieties. The ABLs and released varieties are referred to as improved germplasm accessions (IGA) in this study. The association of DNA methylation patterns with economically important traits such as days to 50% flowering, raceme length, fresh pods plant^-1, fresh pod yield plant^-1 and 100-fresh seed weight was explored. At least 50 genotypes were polymorphic for DNA methylation patterns at 10 loci generated by seven of the 26 RAPD primers. The GA and IGA differed significantly for total, full and external methylation and the frequency of methylation was higher in GA compared to that in IGA. The genotypes with external methylation produced longer racemes than those with full, internal and non-methylation in that order at polymorphic RAPD-11-242 locus. High pod yielding genotypes had significantly lower frequency of full methylation than low yielding ones. On the contrary, the genotypes that produced heavier fresh seeds harboured higher frequencies of total and externally methylated loci than those that produced lighter fresh seeds.