K. Cherifi et al., GENETIC DIVERSITY IN SOME NATURAL-POPULAT IONS OF M-CILIARIS (L) KROCK AND M-INTERTEXTA (L) MILL-I ANALYSIS OF MORPHOLOGICAL VARIABILITY, Agronomie, 13(10), 1993, pp. 895-908
Genetic diversity was studied in 11 populations naturelles de Medicago
annuelles, origin northern Tunisia: 8 populations of M ciliaris and 3
populations of M intertexta. Twenty morphological characters, related
to vegetative and reproductive development of plants cultivated in co
ntrolled conditions, were studied. Canonical discriminant analysis and
Mahalanobis's distance showed an important variability within and bet
ween populations, and a net separation between population groups of th
e 2 species. However, one population of M intertexta seems to present
morphological similarity with M ciliaris. This particular situation su
ggests the possibility of introgressive hybridization between these 2
taxa.