Genetic variation among different populations of Centaurea virgata from Iran using start codon targeted (SCoT) markers

The aim of the present study is the identification of the genetic variation of Centaurea virgata (Asteraceae) through start codon targeted (SCoT) markers. Forty-two specimens of said species were collected from 11 different regions of Iran. Ten primers revealed 131 amplifications ranging from 200 bp to 3 kbp, of which 102 (77.86%) were polymorphic. Polymorphism information content (PIC) ranged from 0.37 to 0.50 with an average of 0.43, effective multiplex ration (EMR) from 1 to 4.11 and marker index (MI) from 0.006 to 0.59. Based on the analysis of molecular variance (AMOVA), the genetic variation within populations (72%) was higher than that of those among populations (28%). Overall, the highest mean for Nei’s gene diversity (0.18), Shannon index (0.27) and percentage of polymorphic loci (47.83) were observed in W. Azarbaijan populations, similarly the highest mean of total heterozygosity (HT) and subpopulation heterozygosity (HS) were found to be 0.18 and 0.07 in W. Azarbaijan and Golestan populations, respectively. The high genetic differentiation (GST = 1) showed significant genetic variation in Razavi Khorasan, N. Khorasan, Kurdistan, and Hamedan populations. Neighbor-Joining and population structure analysis divided C. virgata populations into six main clusters. The current study showed that, SCoT marker was efficient in assessing the genetic variation among different populations of the studied species.