RAPD and FAME analyses of Astragalus species growing in eastern Anatolia region of Turkey

Fatty acid (FAs) and RAPID profiles were used to examine phenotypic and genetic relationships between eight Astragalus species including Astragalus maximus Willd. var. maximus, Astragalus coadunatus Hub. Mor. & Chamb., Astragalus kurdicus Boiss. var. kurdicus, Astragalus lagurus Willd, Astragalus christianus L., Astragalus cicer L., Astragalus atrocarpus Champ & Matthews and Astragalus onobrychioides Bieb., which were wildly growing in eastern Anatolia region of Turkey. All of the eight Astragalus species tested in this study were separated based on the presence and composition of 45 different FAs. Four of the Astragalus species including A. coadunatus, A. lagurus, A. christianus, and A. atrocarpus were rich in terms of FA contents containing at least 22-31 different FAs. The relative proportions of two fatty acids, 16:0, and 18:1:omega 8c were higher in these four Astragalus species. The remaining species have limited number of FAs with unique FAMEs profiles. Six of the 10 decamer primers examined were selected to find out genetic polymorphism in Astragalus species. A total of 98 polymorphic bands were observed, ranging in size from 250 bp to 3000 bp. The RAPID results suggested that A. atrocarpus, A. onobrychioides and A. kurdicus are closely related and completely different from the other species. Six genetically distinct groups were found among the species of Astragalus. High genetic variations among Astragalus species growing wildly in eastern Anatolia region of Turkey may imply the differences in their origins. The results in the present study suggested that both RAPID and FA analyses are useful for differentiation of Astragalus species. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.