Comparative Analysis of the Genetic Diversity of Faba Bean
(Vicia faba L.) - Abstract
Eleni Avramidou 1,3, Ioannis Ganopoulos 2, Eleni M. Abraham 3, Irini Nianiou-Obeidat 4, Maslin
Osathanunkul 5,6 and Panagiotis Madesis 1,7
1
  Institute of Applied Biosciences (INAB), CERTH, 6th Km Charilaou-Thermi Road, 57001 Thessaloniki, Greece
2
  Hellenic Agricultural Organization Demeter, Institute of plant breeding and Genetic Resources, IPB and GR,
Thermi, 57001 Thessaloniki, Greece.
3
  Laboratory of Range Science, Faculty of Forestry and Natural Environment, Aristotle University (236)
4
  Laboratory of Genetics and Plant Breeding, School of Agriculture, Forestry and Natural Environment,
Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, 54124 Thessaloniki, Greece
5
  Department of Biology, Faculty of Science, Chiang Mai University, Chiang Mai, 50200, Thailand
6
  Research Center in Bioresources for Agriculture, Industry and Medicine, Chiang Mai University, 50200,
Thailand
7
  Department of Agriculture Crop Production and Rural Environment, University of Thessaly, Fytokou St., N.
Ionia, 38446 Magnesia, Greece


                Summary 1
                Faba bean (Vicia faba L.) is an important grain legume with high protein content
                (approximately 25- 30%) and high nutritional value. It is broadly cultivated in temperate areas
                for human consumption and as an animal feed. Although the exact origin of Faba bean is
                unknown, it is accepted that it was one of the earliest food legumes to be domesticated and has
                probably been cultivated since the Neolithic period. According to FAOSTAT (2016), the total
                cultivated area of Faba bean reached approximately 2.15 million ha, yielding more than 4.14
                million tons. Faba bean production ranked seventh among all legume crops worldwide.
                Nevertheless, Faba bean cultivars have anti- nutritional compounds such as tannins, which are
                primarily located in the seed coat which limit their use for both human and animal
                consumption. In this respect, the characterization of the genetic diversity in Faba bean is an
                important parameter for genetic and biodiversity studies, germplasm characterization, as well
                as for introducing genetic variability in plant breeding. Technical advances in molecular
                genetics allowed the application of molecular markers for measuring genetic variation at the
                DNA level. The advantages of using DNA markers is that they are not affected by
                environmental factors, plant developmental stages and have been successfully used for
                studying the genetic diversity in various crop species, including Faba bean. The present study
                aims to assess the genetic diversity among 53 varied Faba bean populations provided by the
                Hellenic Agricultural Organization “DEMETER” seed bank. To determine the genetic
                diversity of the studied populations, six SCoT DNA markers were used. A total of 114 loci
                were obtained with 37.95% being polymorphic and 62.05% monomorphic within or between
                populations. Among the populations, VF37 exhibited the highest level of polymorphisms (P=
                57.02%) and VF78 the lowest (P= 21.05%). According to Shannon’s information index VF37
                had higher levels of genetic variation (0.328) compared to other populations. In addition,
                population VF36 showed two private bands followed by VF37 and VF57 with one private
                band. Furthermore, the AMOVA (Analysis of Molecular Variance) showed that 56% of the
                total genetic variation was attributed to differences within populations and the rest (44%) was
                attributed to differences among populations. SCoT markers are useful tool for the detection of
                genetic diversity among Faba bean populations and encourage targeted crossing strategies. The
                present study is a first step towards the development of an efficient breeding program.

Proceedings of HAICTA 2022, September 22–25, 2022, Athens, Greece
EMAIL: leleav_av@yahoo.gr (A. 1); giannis.ganopoulos@gmail.com (A. 2); eabraham@for.auth.gr (A. 3); nianiou@agro.auth.gr (A. 4);
omaslin@gmail.com (A. 5); pmadesis@certh.gr (A. 6)
ORCID: 0000-0001-7967-5702 (A. 2); 0000-0003-4032-5830 (A. 3); 0000-0001-5838-6370 (A. 4); 0000-0003-1447-3514 (A. 6)
             ©️ 2022 Copyright for this paper by its authors.
             Use permitted under Creative Commons License Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0).
             CEUR Workshop Proceedings (CEUR-WS.org)




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Keywords
Faba bean, genetic diversity, SCoT molecular markers, seed bank, population genetic




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