Application of Microsatellite Analysis to the Screening of Putative Parents of Sugarcane Cross Aa40

In 1993 the genetic mapping of South African sugarcane cross, AA40, was initiated. However preliminary RFLP data suggested that the pedigree of the AA40 cross was incorrect. Mislabelling at planting or at seed collection was suspected as the cause of the invalid pedigree. Ten microsatellites (simple sequence repeats; SSRs) were used to analyse 13 potential parent cultivars and investigate the assertion of both mislabelling at planting (six potential parent pairs) and in a restricted manner that of mislabelling at seed collection (two potential parent pairs). The SSR primers chosen generated a total of 75 markers, of which 19 were monomorphic. The number of markers recorded per SSR primer pair across the 13 cultivars tested ranged between 2 and 11 with an average of 8. Although this work failed to identify the parents of the AA40 population, it did imply that the invalid pedigree of the AA40 population came about as a result of mislabelling at seed collection.