Abstract

Trichosanthes dioica Roxb. belongs to family Cucurbitaceae and commonly known as pointed gourd. It is perennial, dioecious and cross pollinated vegetable crop, widely cultivated in eastern Uttar Pradesh of India.  22 cultivars of male and female of T. dioicafrom various agro-climatic regions of India have been fingerprinted by RAPD and ISSR markers utilizing 37, 15 primers respectively. To understand genetic relationships among these cultivars, Jaccard’s similarity coefficient and UPGMA clustering algorithm were applied to the two marker data sets. The percentage of polymorphism range for RAPD is from 89 to 45% while for ISSR is from 88 to 100%, the UPGMA dendogram obtained from the cluster analysis of RAPD and ISSR data gave similar clustering pattern, with Jaccards similarity coefficient ranging from 0.23 to 0.93. This study showed that RAPD and ISSR markers could provide a practical and efficient tool in quality control of the T. dioica. The present report is, therefore, a step to protect the plant breeders rights by making use of reliable and modern DNA technologies.

Key words: Trichosanthes dioica Roxb., RAPD, ISSR, genetic diversity.