GENETIC VARIABILITY OF MANGO (MANGIFERA INDICA L.) CULTIVARS USED IN THE EMBRAPA CERRADOS BREEDING PROGRAM USING RAPD MARKERS

Embrapa Cerrados has been working on mango breeding program through intervarietal hybridization using cultivars from India, South Africa, Nigeria, Mexico, USA and Brazil since 1983. The objective of this work was to evaluate the genetic variability of 28 mango cultivars of the parental group used in the Embrapa Cerrados breeding program. The genomic DNA of each cultivar was extracted and amplified using 21 decamer primers to obtain RAPD molecular markers. These markers were transformed into a binary matrix data to estimate genetic distances among cultivars and to perform cluster analysis. From the 350 molecular markers obtained, 16.3% were monomorphic. The genetic distances among the 28 cultivars ranged from 0.098 and 0.331. The lowest genetic distances were detected between the cultivars 'Edward' and 'Glenn' (0.098), 'Tommy Atkins' and 'Keitt' (0.101), as well as 'Apple' and 'Malindi' (0.112). There is high genetic variability among mango cultivars from different countries, including the Brazilian ones. There was a grouping tendency of the important cultivars from USA. These results emphasize the importance of the cultivars used in the Embrapa Cerrados breeding program and provide useful information for future mango breeding activities.