Morphological and Molecular Characterization of Traditional Rice Cultivar “Hondarawala”

Traditional rice cultivars are popular among farmers due to their grain quality characteristics and higher tolerance to drought, salinity, water logging conditions and low-fertile soils. Studies on available diversity within these cultivars provide useful information in varietal improvement in rice, when they are utilized as good sources of useful traits. In this study, genetic diversity of 21 accessions of Hondarawala, conserved at Plant Genetic Resources Centre (PGRC), Sri Lanka was assessed through morphological and molecular means. Thirty-nine morphological traits were assessed based on PGRC descriptors. A total of 30 SSR markers were used and genetic diversity was analyzed using Power Marker 3.25 version. Multivariable cluster analysis separated the selected germplasm into eight phenotypic groups at 82% similarity where 13 accessions clustered together, while other 8 accessions stayed separately. Molecular study revealed a total of 123 alleles across the tested accessions Polymorphic information content values ranging between 0.086 and 0.735 setting the mean at 0.505 and the allele number ranging from 4 to 6. Based on the genetic distances, these 21 accessions grouped in to 3 different clusters and 1, 14 and 6 Hondarawala accessions grouped in each cluster respectively. Ten accessions clustered together in morphological and molecular grouping and were identified as the representative sample of Hondaralawala. The results revealed that there is a considerable morphological and genetic diversity available among accessions of the same cultivar which makes it important in systematic conservation of the germplasm and provide information for utilization.