Ultra-barcoding in cacao (Theobroma spp.; Malvaceae) using whole chloroplast genomes and nuclear ribosomal DNA

? Premise of study: To reliably identify lineages below the species level such as subspecies or varieties, we propose an extension to DNA-barcoding using next-generation sequencing to produce whole organellar genomes and substantial nuclear ribosomal sequence. Because this method uses much longer versions of the traditional DNA-barcoding loci in the plastid and ribosomal DNA, we call our approach ultra-barcoding (UBC). ? Methods: We used high-throughput next-generation sequencing to scan the genome and generate reliable sequence of high copy number regions. Using this method, we examined whole plastid genomes as well as nearly 6000 bases of nuclear ribosomal DNA sequences for nine genotypes of Theobroma cacao and an individual of the related species T. grandiflorum, as well as an additional publicly available whole plastid genome of T. cacao. ? Key results: All individuals of T. cacao examined were uniquely distinguished, and evidence of reticulation and gene flow was observed. Sequence variation was observed in some of the canonical barcoding regions between species, but other regions of the chloroplast were more variable both within species and between species, as were ribosomal spacers. Furthermore, no single region provides the level of data available using the complete plastid genome and rDNA. ? Conclusions: Our data demonstrate that UBC is a viable, increasingly cost-effective approach for reliably distinguishing varieties and even individual genotypes of T. cacao. This approach shows great promise for applications where very closely related or interbreeding taxa must be distinguished.     

DNA条形码在入侵植物鉴定中的应用进展

生物入侵对世界经济、环境造成了巨大的影响,已经成为世界关注的焦点。传统的海关检验方法存在鉴定缓慢、准确率低、鉴定专家稀缺等问题,因此急需一种鉴定率高、操作简单和快速的方法对入侵植物的繁殖体进行精确的鉴别。DNA条形码是一种基于DNA序列差异进行物种鉴定的技术,鉴定结果只受样品组织内DNA保存状况影响,不受形态学性状保存状态影响,只需掌握简单分子生物学技术的工作人员即可实现对未知样品的鉴定,在入侵植物检疫鉴定中有很大的应用潜力。根据入侵植物进化快、变异多的特点,可优先考虑种间、种内差异度高的ITS基因作为核心条形码,再以mat K和rbc L基因为辅助条形码。本文分析了植物DNA条形码技术及其衍生出的超级DNA条形码和metabarcoding技术在入侵植物鉴定中的应用潜力,提出构建入侵植物DNA条形码参考数据库与智能植物志(i Flora)相结合,为利用DNA条形码技术对入侵植物进行快速鉴定和相关研究提供参考。