Fingerprinting of Rice (Oryza sativa) Landraces from Three Geopolitical Zones in Ebonyi State Nigeria using SDS-page

The genetic variability among ten (10) accessions of Rice (Oryza sativa) from three (3) Geopolitical zones (Ikwo, Afikpo and Abakaliki) in Ebonyi State Nigeria were assessed using sodium dodecyl polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis (SDS - PAGE). There were variations in the banding patterns of the accessions and polymorphism was also observed. The banding patterns of the 10 accessions were examined and photographed. The number of reproducible bands was recorded by observation of gels and photographs. The molecular weights of the protein bands were deduced using molecular weights of the pro-mega standard and dendrogram was also constructed in order to place different clusters and groups of the 10 accessions in the right places for easy identification. Twelve polypeptide bands were obtained ranging from 10KDa to 245KDa. The Unweight Pair Group Method with Mean Algorithm (UPGMA) dendrogram grouped the ten accessions into two clusters and five groups. Some accessions appeared in the same group, while others were observed to be in different groups. Accessions ( 3, 5, 6 and 7) neither show any atom of similarities with each other nor with the remaining accessions in terms of banding patterns and number of bands (they are significantly different) so they were placed on Group 5. This significant difference for most of the characters is an indication of wide genetic variability among the collections, which could be exploited in selection and breeding for improved varieties.