Determination of the genetic relationships between Petrorhagia species distributed in Turkey

In this thesis study, it is studied with total 45 individuals by using 5 individuals belong to 9 taxa from Petrorhagia (Ser.) Link (Caryophyllaceae) genus naturally occurring in Turkey and targeted to determine genetic relationship levels with ISSR markers that is a PCR based technique. These species are P. dubia, P. prolifera, P. pamphylica, P. peroninii, P. saxifraga, P. cretica, P. alpina subsp. alpina, P. alpina subsp. olympica, P. lycica. In the study, it is used 10 ISSR primers and has created totally 409 ISSR bands all of them polymorphic. The number of bands formed by primers have changed between 25 and 64, avarage band number is 41,1. The size of bands have changed between 200 bp and 2500 bp. The bands obtained were recorded either present (1) or absent (0) and similarity matris was produced. Statistical analysis were performed by using POPGENE 1.32 and dendrogram based on genetic distance between Petrorhagia species was constructed by using UPGMA technique. According to our results the closest Petrorhagia species were P. peroninii and P. dubia (0.0491). The farthest species were P. lycica and P. saxifraga (0.1198). The study showed that ISSR technique can be successfully used in determination of the genetic relationships between Petrorhagia species distributed in Turkey. In addition our study represents the first molecular work on Turkish Petrorhagia species. The results obtained from this study could be used in further studies about estimation of genetic variation within any endemic Petrorhagia species.Keywords: Caryophyllaceae, Petrorhagia, ISSR, Genetic relationship