ABSTRACT
Endopolygalacturonase
(endoPG) plays a pivotal role in determining peach [Prunus persica L.
(Batsch)] fruit characteristics. Different Pp-endoPG genes or allelic variants have been described, characterized by different
polymorphisms: insertions-deletions (InDels) and single nucleotide
polymorphisms (SNPs). Eighty-five peach accessions (comprising
commercial cultivars, F1 progenies of selected crosses, and three
haploid seedlings) with different flesh softening patterns
(Non Melting: NM; Melting: M; Slow Softening: SS; Stony Hard: SH) were screened
by exploiting specific polymorphisms, with the aim to characterize their asset
at the endoPG locus and evaluate a
potential relationship with fruit flesh texture phenotype. The results of InDel analysis allowed to distinguish, by a simple genotyping procedure, NM flesh
phenotypes from the others. Further information arose from this analysis, showing that two Pp-endoPG genes, i.e., Pp-endoPGm (Ppa006839m), involved in the determination of the Melting/Non Melting
trait, and Pp-endoPG_M (Ppa006857m), involved in the determination of the Clingstone/Freestone trait, always co-segregate,
and that SS Big Top possesses a “null” Pp-endoPG allele. Cleaved Amplified
Polymorphic Sequence (CAPS) analysis allowed to preliminarily
discriminate the Pp-endoPG variants
of the SS and SH accessions considered. The integrated use of the considered
polymorphisms in a high number of peach accessions proved useful, by individuating
the different gene variants and their combinations, to describe the structure
of the endoPG locus in different
genotypes.
Share and Cite:
Morgutti, S. , Negrini, N. , Ghiani, A. , Baldin, F. , Bassi, D. and Cocucci, M. (2017)
Endopolygalacturonase Gene Polymorphisms: Asset of the Locus in Different Peach Accessions.
American Journal of Plant Sciences,
8, 941-957. doi:
10.4236/ajps.2017.84063.