Transferability of SSR markers across twelve species of forage legumes for germplasm characterization and evaluation

Abstract

Simple sequence repeat (SSR) or microsatellite marker is the most preferred and reliable molecular marker system. However, development and use of such markers for evolution and diversity assessment is limited to few tropical forage legumes. In the present investigation, 43 SSR markers of Medicago truncatula and Trifolium repens from existing data bases were used to assess their transferability in 24 accessions of 12 tropical legume species of forage importance. Cross-genus amplification of M. truncatula based SSR was 32.08% whereas only 23.97% transferability of T. repens markers was observed. Seventy six polymorphic amplicons were identified could be used as DNA markers. Identified markers were demonstrated in characterization of 24 accessions of Desmanthus, thus indicated their suitability. The transfer of SSR markers across species or genus can be a very efficient approach for DNA markers development, especially for less explored legumes of tropical forage importance.