Chloroplast Genome-Based Hypervariable Markers for Rapid Authentication of Six KoreanPyropia Species

• Published in: Diversity
• Main Authors: Sung-Je Choi, Yonguk Kim, Chulyung Choi
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: MDPI AG 2019-11-01
• Subjects: pyropia; chloroplast genome; indel; nucleotide diversity; dna barcode
• Online Access: https://www.mdpi.com/1424-2818/11/12/220

We previously established that polymerase chain reaction-restriction fragment length polymorphism (PCR-RFLP) analysis using partial plastid rbcL and mitochondrial trnC&#8722;trnP gene sequences can be used to distinguish the six representative Pyropia species produced via mariculture in Korea. In this study, we develop progressive InDel markers by comparing seven complete <i>Pyropia</i> chloroplast genomes obtained from The National Center of Biotechnology Informnation (NCBI) GenBank. Comparative analyses of nucleotide diversity among the genomes revealed seven hypervariable sites (cemA, rps13, trnM-argB, petD-petB, trnR-trnQ, ccs1-orf24, and ycf12-ftrB) among 637 sliding windows with nucleotide diversity &gt; 0.025 (Pi). These sites included two genes and five gene-intergenic regions, three of which (cemA, trnM-argB, trnR-trnQ) showed complete amplification for all six test species. Finally, trnM-argB, an InDel-variable locus with high discriminatory power, was selected as a DNA barcode candidate. These results suggest that the obtained trnM-argB region can be used for the effective exploration of the variation present in six Korean <i>Pyropia</i> and for further evolutionary, phylogenetic, barcoding and genetic engineering studies of <i>Pyropia</i> species.