VARIATION IN COXII INTRON IN THE WILD ANCESTRAL SPECIES OF WHEAT

To study the maternal lineage and evolution of polyploid species of wh eat, variation in mitochondrial DNA was investigated in Triticum and A egilops by PCR-aided RFLP analysis. A 1.3 kb region containing the int ron of coxII was studied using 20 accessions from five species of Sito psis section of Aegilops, one species of Einkorn wheat, four species o f tetraploid wheat, and one species of common wheat. Only three restri ction site changes and a single deletion/insertion were found among 88 4 restriction fragments surveyed. This fact suggests the highly conser ved nature of this region within Triticum and Aegilops. Four haplo-typ es were recognized in coxII intron. A parsimonious relationship indica ted that three haplo-types were independently derived from one prototy pe which was found in wild Einkorn and Aegilops species except for Ae. speltoides. All but one accession of Ae. speltoides possessed a deriv ative haplo-type, common in Timopheevi wheal. The result supported the hypothesis that Ae. speltoides donated the G genome to Timopheevi whe at; however did not agree with that Ae. speltoides was the B genome do nor to the Emmer and common wheat.