Assessment of cytological and morphological variation among Iranian native Iris species

Abstract

In order to study the morphological and cytological variation among Iranian native Irises, first, morphological traits were analyzed in order to clarify taxonomic relationships among taxa and validity of diagnostic characters. Floral and vegetative characters were measured in 54 plant samples belonging to five species during peak of the flowering season in 2008. Analysis of variance showed significant differences. Result of analysis shows that the most variation coefficient belongs to leaf width. Correlation of coefficients defined between the date of the first blooming of the flowers and the date of the least blooming of the flowers, flowers surface and diameter had the positive and significant correlation. Factor analysis showed that only three factors define almost near to 92% variance among characters. Secondly, in cytological variation each species showed different karyotypic formula such as 2n = 2sm+ 14st+4t for Iris meda, 2n = 8m + 16sm + 20st with one pair of terminal satellite chromosomes for Iris caspica, 2n = 26m + 18sm for Iris spuria, 2n= 14m + 12sm + 8st with one pair of terminal satellite chromosomes for Iris pseudacorous and 2n= 8m + 20sm + 20st for Iris germanica. This is the first karyotypic report in I. caspica, I. spuria and I. meda species in Iran. The results seemed to provide enough genetic evidence to identify each species and useful data to clarify the interspecific relationships among Iranian native Iris species.

Key words: Iris, karyotype, Iranian native, chromosome analysis, genome.