An assessment of genetic relationships in cultivated tea clones and nativewild tea in Taiwan using RAPD and ISSR maskers

Tea (Camellia sinensis [L.] O. Kuntze) is an important beverage crop in Tai wan. Most of the cultivated clones were introduced from China and India tho ugh some native wild teas are distributed in the mountains of central and s outhern Taiwan. in this study, 37 tea samples were evaluated using RAPD and ISSR markers. The samples comprised 21 clones of China, 3 clones of Assam, 7 hybrid clones between China and Assam tea? and 6 individual samples of n ative Taiwanese wild tea. A total of 53 and 56 polymorphic RAPD and ISSR ma rkers respectively, were scored. Tile results of cluster analysis based on RAPDs revealed that three major groups could he recognized, i.e,, cultivars of China tea and the cultivars developed in Taiwan from hybridization and selection; Assam tea; native Taiwanese wild tea. The native Taiwanese wild teas were, however, most distant in the clustering tree, In the ISSR dendro gram. Taiwanese native wild teas clustered closely with Assam tea then with China tea and the Taiwanese hybrid cultivars. The population gene diversit y of the native wild tea was found to be the highest among the three popula tions studied. Analysis of molecular variance (AMOVA) revealed that the var iance component within groups was larger than that among groups. The correl ation coefficient between similarity matrices based on RAPD and ISSR was 0. 811. A Mantel test revealed that the correlation was highly significant (p <0.001), indicating good congruence between the results of these two molecu lar markers.