Study of genomic fingerprints profile of Magnaporthe grisea from finger millet (Eleusine Coracona) by random amplified polymorphic DNA-polymerase chain reaction (RAPD-PCR)

Abstract

Finger millet (Eleusine coracana (L) Gaertn (FM) is a major food for  resource poor farmers in several parts of India as well as the world. Blast caused by heterothallic ascomycete Magnaporthe grisea (Hebert) Barr. (Anamorph: Pyricularia grisea) is the most important constraint to finger millet production in most finger millet growing environments. The  pathogen also causes the catastrophic blast disease in rice as well as 50 other graminaceous hosts, but is considered host specific. M. grisea is notorious for its diversity and genetic variability. This study was done to generate genomic finger prints using random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) markers as well as to find out genetic diversity in M. grisea isolates collected from three different geographical regions (hilly area) of Uttarakhand. A total of forty five isolates and fifteen RAPD primers were used to generate genomic fingerprint profile which depicted about 25 to 40% linkage distance and resulted in formation of two major groups. Polymorphism range shown by RAPD primers was 71.40 to 90%, while the range of total loci scored was from 07 to 10. The molecular weight of scorable loci ranged from 150 to 2500 bp. The results obtained confirmed the genetic diversity and virulence complexity of rice blast fungus among samples under study.

Keywords: Magnaporthe grisea, ragi blast, random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD), genetic lineage,
dendrogram, polymorphism