Elucidating genetic relationships, diversity and population structure among the Turkish female figs.

A collection of 96 female Turkish fig (Ficus carica L.) accessions was studied to elucidate genetic structure and estimate diversity and genetic similarity distribution among the female figs present in Turkish genetic resources, using 157 molecular genome markers including 129 sequence-related amplified polymorphisms, 21 random amplified polymorphic DNAs, and 7 simple-sequence repeats. The plant samples mainly included Turkish fig collections selected throughout the country over the course of a half-century. Neighbor-joining analysis revealed continuous dissimilarity range, and it was difficult to classify figs into distinct groups. The principle component analysis produced similar results. The analysis of molecular variance indicated that 95 and 93% of genetic variation were explained by within geographic origins and similar fruit rind color, respectively. Sub-structuring Bayesian analysis assigned the 96 female figs into four sub-populations, and indicated that they were highly related. The corrected allelic pairwise distances among the six geographic origins were less than 5%. This study suggests that geography- and color-based groups were not genetically distinct among the Turkish figs.