Genetic Diversity in Southeast European Soybean Germplasm Revealed by SSR Markers

Breeding material and registered soybean cultivars in Southeast European countries are strongly linked to Western breeding programs, primarily in the USA and Canada. Th ere is little reliable information regarding the source of germplasm introduction, its pedigree and breeding schemes applied. Consequently, use of these genotypes in making crosses to develop further breeding cycles can result in an insuffi cient level of genetic variability. Th e objective of this study was to assess genetic diversity and relationships of 23 soybean genotypes representing several independent breeding sources from Southeastern Europe and fi ve plant introductions from Western Europe and Canada using 20 SSR markers. In total 80 alleles were detected among 28 genotypes with an average of four alleles per locus and an average marker diversity of 0.585. Allele frequency distribution was characterised with a high proportion of alleles at very low frequencies with 11 % of unique alleles. Cluster analysis clearly separated all genotypes from each other assigning them into three major clusters, which largely corresponded to their origin. Results of clustering were mainly in accordance with the known pedigrees.