Genotyping-by-sequencing identifies date palm clone preference in agronomics of the State of Qatar

PLoS One. 2018 Dec 5;13(12):e0207299. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0207299. eCollection 2018.

Abstract

Understanding the genetic diversity in a crop population is key to its targeted breeding for desired traits, such as higher yields, better fruit quality and resistance to disease and changing climates. Date fruits represent a major crop in the Middle East and are key to achieving future food independence in arid countries like Qatar. We previously determined the genome of the date palm Phoenix dactylifera and showed that date palm trees world-wide divide into two distinct subpopulations of Eastern and Western origins. Here we applied a resource of SNPs from 179 commercially available date fruits to assess the genetic diversity of date palm trees grown in the State of Qatar. We found that palm trees in Qatar are mainly of Eastern origin, and that their genetic diversity doesn't associate with regions of the State. Together with targeted genetic assays, our resource can be used in the future for date palm cultivar identification, to aid selecting suitable cultivars for targeted breeding, to improve a country's date palm genetic diversity, and to certify the origin of date fruits and trees.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Agriculture / methods
  • DNA, Plant / genetics
  • Genetic Variation / genetics
  • Genome, Plant / genetics
  • Genotype
  • High-Throughput Nucleotide Sequencing / methods*
  • Middle East
  • Phoeniceae / genetics*
  • Polymorphism, Single Nucleotide / genetics
  • Qatar
  • Sequence Analysis, DNA / methods

Substances

  • DNA, Plant

Grants and funding

This project was funded by NPRP-EP grant X-014-4-001 to KS from the Qatar National Research Fund, a member of Qatar Foundation. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.