Detection of species specific protein markers for Cajanus cajan and C. cajanifolius

Abstract

Electrophoretic analysis of seed albumin of six varieties of Cajanus cajan, its two local land races (LLRs) and its putative progenitor C. cajanifolius resulted in detection of 16 distinct polypeptide bands of molecular weights ranging from 10.0 to 54.1 kd. Of these, four albumin bands of 10.0, 14.7, 39.8 and 54.1 kd were unique to C. cajanifolius, while two bands of 13.6 and 29.2 kd were specific to C. cajan. The four C. cajanifolius specific bands could be used as reliable markers to verify hybridity in wide hybridization for introgression of stress resistance genes into C. cajan using the former as the male donor parent.