MOLECULAR IDENTIFICATION OF GENDER IN POPULUS CILIATA WALL. EX ROYLE USING ISOZYME AND RAPD MARKERS
Populus ciliata Wall. ex Royle is a large deciduous, indigenous, dioecious native tree of Himachal Pradesh. Sex chromosomes are not identified in this species and at juvenile stage, male and female trees do not reveal any significant difference in growth and other related characteristics. At maturity male and female trees are different from each other on the basis of biomass, growth rate and habitat etc. Near habitation, propagation of male plants is recommended because seed production cause many health problems. Therefore some reliable and quick methods need to be developing for sex identification. The present study deals with the development of isozyme and RAPD marker for gender determination. The isozyme analysis conducted with seven enzyme systems (peroxidase, esterase, malate dehydrogenase, alcohol dehydrogenase, catalase, ribulosebisphosphate carboxilase and acid phosphatase), two enzymes peroxidase and esterase successfully showed the differentiation between male and female genotypes. Peroxidase enzyme produced one female specific band where as esterase enzyme produce one male and one female specific band which distinguished the female genotype from the male genotype. Out of ten polymorphic random primers used, one primer (OPK-20) gave significant difference between male and female trees and identified as female specific marker (OPK-20400, OPK-20500 and OPK-20800). All these identified markers can be used to distinguish the sex of P. ciliata at an early stage