BackgroundTraditional agroecosystems are known to host both large crop species diversity and high within crop genetic diversity. In a context of global change, this diversity may be needed to feed the world. Are these agroecosystems museums (i.e. large core collections) or cradles of diversity? We investigated this question for a clonally propagated plant, fig (Ficus carica), within its native range, in Morocco, but as far away as possible from supposed centers of domestication.ResultsFig varieties were locally numerous. They were found to be mainly highly local and corresponded to clones propagated vegetatively. Nevertheless these clones were often sufficiently old to have accumulated somatic mutations for selected traits (fig skin color) and at neutral loci (microsatellite markers). Further the pattern of spatial genetic structure was similar to the pattern expected in natural population for a mutation/drift/migration model at equilibrium, with homogeneous levels of local genetic diversity throughout Moroccan traditional agroecosystems.ConclusionsWe conclude that traditional agroecosystems constitue active incubators of varietal diversity even for clonally propagated crop species, and even when varieties correspond to clones that are often old. As only female fig is cultivated, wild fig and cultivated fig probably constitute a single evolutionary unit within these traditional agroecosystems. Core collections, however useful, are museums and hence cannot serve the same functions as traditional agroecosystems.

Background: Several chronic inflammatory diseases are characterized by inappropriate CD4+ T cell response. In the present study, we assessed the ability of Capparis spinosa L. (CS) preparation to orientate, in vivo, the immune response mediated by CD4+ T cells towards an anti-inflammatory response.

Accurate and reliable cultivar identification of crop species is essential to ensure plant material identity for registration and for cultivar protection. In this article, we proposed six simple sequence repeat (SSR) loci as a sufficient tool to characterize fig (Ficus carica L.) germplasm in Morocco maintained in an ex situ collection. A set of 17 microsatellite loci was used to characterize 75 accessions representing eight caprifigs, 51 local accessions, 11 foreign accessions, and five accessions of unknown origin. Eighty-five alleles with a mean number of six alleles per locus were observed in 62 distinct genotypes. Suspected synonyms and homonyms were confirmed, some of which maybe resulted from somatic mutation. Based on genetic criteria, including linkage disequilibrium, discrimination power, and molecular criteria as polymerase chain reaction conditions of loci multiplexing, we proposed a key identification set using six microsatellite markers to discriminate all genotypes present in the ex situ collection. Our selected SSR loci set can be used for larger genetic studies of fig germplasm, and a similar approach can be adopted for other fruit species.