assessment of genetic stability of olive in vitro propagated by rapd marker

the effect of sub culturing frequencies and different cytokinins (benzyl amino purine (bap), 2-isopentenyl adenine (2ip) on genetic stability of micropropagated shoots from olive plant were investigated by using physiological traits and random amplified polymorphic dna (rapd) markers. axillary buds of the olive (cv. dezful) plants were cultured and subcultured in dkw medium, supplemented with bap (4 mgl-1) or 2-ip (4 mgl-1). in different hormone media and subcultures there were not significant differences in shoot proliferation rate. to amplify dna, 18 arbitrary decamer primers were screened, out of which 16 primers generated clear and reproducible bands. all rapd profiles from the micropropagated plants were monomorphic. the treatments included four successive subcultures in two hormone treatments (2ip or bap) (4 mgl-1) the 16 primers produced a total of 213 (an average of 13.31 band per primer) scorable bands. the dendrogram constructed on the basis of jaccard’s similarity matrix, followed by upgma based clustering analysis showed that micropropagated plants were genetically stable and similar to the mother plant.