GENETICS OF SEED STORAGE PROTEINS IN THE LOVE TREE CERCIS SILIQUASTRUM L (FABACEAE)

The patterns of C. siliquastrum seed storage proteins (''cercins'') ar e described using SDS-polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis. The polypept ides detected had very different molecular weights (ranging from 168 t o 34 KDa) which, together with their high homogeneity, produced a very good resolution of bands. These proteins could be ascribed to five di fferent loci. The analysis of seed sets of individual trees indicated that the love tree is almost completely autogamous with less than 5% o f outcrosses. Although this mode of reproduction seems to produce a de crease in heterozygote frequency among the seeds of the population ana lysed, the levels of variability detected were very high for an autoga mous plant: all of the loci were polymorphic, with a mean heterozygosi ty of 0.327 and a polymorphic index of 0.412. Protein segregation reve aled a strong genetic linkage between three cercin loci (a, c and d) w hile the other two are independent.