Abstract:

Genetic variations are highly important in terms of plant breeding. These variations occur either spontaneously or artificially by mutations and sexual hybridizations in order to achieve specific breeding objectives. In this study, persimmon genetic resources collected from Turkey and preserved ex situ with commercial cultivars in a germplasm orchard located at Çukurova University, Turkey, were characterized based on their morphological traits. The collection was composed of traditional genotypes and local accessions together with global varieties. For the morphological characterization, 59 morphological and agronomic traits were investigated: 9 related to plant growth, 5 to leaf characteristics, 7 to flower traits, 32 to fruit traits, and 6 to seed traits. Moreover, the data obtained in this process were subjected to similarity coefficient, principal component, and cluster analyses to demonstrate the overall phenotypic relationships among these genotypes. The cumulative proportion of variation reached 39.04% with the first three PCA axes. The first component was based on shoot length, trunk surface structure, flowering time of female flowers, fruit length, and diameter. The twelve factor scores represented 74.75% of the total multivariate variation, and cluster analysis indicated that the similarity index of the population consisting of the investigated genotypes ranged between 81.09% and 17.32%.

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