Polymorphism of hordei-coding loci in Near Eastern local populations of cultivated barley (Hordeum vulgare L.)

Electrophoresis in starch gel has been used to study the polymorphism of hordeins encoded by loci Hrd A, Hrd B, and Hrd F in 140 local barley populations from the Near East, including 60, 34, 33, 8, and 5 populations from Syria, Jordan, Iraq, Palestine, and Israel, respectively. Fifty-seven Hrd A, 87 Hrd B, and 5 Hrd F alleles have been found. The alleles of these loci considerably differ in frequencies and distribution in populations from different Near Eastern countries. Cluster analysis of the matrix of the frequencies of alleles of hordei-coding locus alleles in barley populations from the Near East, North Africa, Ethiopia, and South Arabia has yielded two clusters. The first cluster includes barley populations from Israel, Palestine, Morocco, Tunisia, Algeria, and Egypt; the second cluster, populations from Iraq, Syria, Jordan, Yemen, and Ethiopia.