Molecular characterization of Cassava with yelloworange roots for beta-carotene improvement
Cláudia Fortes Ferreira, Elaine Alves, Kátia Nogueira Pestana, Davi Theodoro Junghans, Adilson Kenji Kobayashi, Vania de Jesus Santos, Raimundo Pereira Silva, Paulo Henrique Silva, Ediclan Soares and Wania Fukuda
Abstract: Casssava (Manihot esculenta Crantz) is one of the main food and income sources of about 500 million people in the tropics. The crop is mainly cultivated by small farmers in tropical Africa, Asia and Latin America. Embrapa Mandioca e Fruticultura Tropical, based in Cruz das Almas, Bahia, maintains one of the largest cassava genebanks of Latin America. Among the accessions it contains, those with yellow-orange root color are particularly interestin g. The objective of this study was to characterize 30 cassava accessions with yellow-orange root color by RAPD markers, The genetic distances of the 47 analyzed primers varied from 9.0 to 31.7 %, demonstrating the existing genetic variability to be exploited for the development of cassava varieties with higher beta-carotene contents.