Applications of RAPD marker technology in raising productivity of fruit crops.
Priyamvada Pandey, Rajesh Kumar
Author Affiliation: Department of Horticulture, G.B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, 263 145, Uttarakhand, India.
Environment and Ecology 32 : 418-424
Abstract : Over the years, horticulture has emerged as one of the potential agricultural enterprise in accelerating the growth of economy. Its role in the country's nutritional security, poverty alleviation and employment generation programmes is becoming increasingly important. India accounts for 10% of the total world production of fruits. It leads the world in the production of mango, banana, sapota and acid lime and has recorded highest productivity in grape. In spite of remarkable increase in production of different fruits following conventional improvement methods and improved management practices, some inherent problems with conventional breeding of woody perennials like long juvenile period, heterogeneity, self-incompatibility and parthenocarpy are causing impediment in further improvement of yield and quality in different fruit crops. With the advent of molecular markers it is now possible to single out differences present at the molecular level, which is more authentic and less affected by environmental factors. Recently, many molecular markers, such as RELP, AFLP, SCAR, ISSR, SSR and RAPD, are used in fruit crops research. RAPD markers consist of relatively short DNA fragments (about 200-2000 base pairs long), amplified via PCR by small arbitrary primers. The resulting amplification product(s) can be reported electrophoretically on an agarose gel and visualized generally by ethidium bromide staining. Assessment of genetic diversity, identification of QTLs, gene cloning, varietal diagnosis, diseases diagnosis, marker assisted selection (MAS) and linkage map are some of the important applications of RAPD reported in various fruit crops.