The natural diversity ofCarica papayain Panama

Abstract

The biodiversity of wild crop species can be threatened by genetic introgression of cultivated traits from co-occurring cultivated varieties. The tropical fruit crop, papaya (Carica papaya L.), is a model organism to study questions related to crop-to-wild gene flow because it is cultivated in Central America alongside natural populations. Morphological and genetic diversity was assessed for a collection of naturally occurring papaya individuals from four regions in Panamá, which is the southern-most extent of papaya's range. Significant morphological variation was limited, and fruit characteristics align with typical wild-type traits; fruits are small and round with a thin mesocarp and yellow flesh. Genetic analyses indicated a deficiency in heterozygosity in all regions except the Northeast region. We found moderate levels of population differentiations and regional structuring. This study provides further insight into the natural biodiversity of a tropical crop cultivated in close proximity to its wild counterparts. THE NATURAL DIVERSITY OF CARICA PAPAYA IN PANAMA

Editorial: Gene Flow Among Wild and Domesticated Plant Species in the Neotropical Region

“…The importance of gene flow in plants has received oscillating recognition along the history of the Evolutionary Synthesis (Ellstrand, 2003), but lately the empirical literature has accumulated more powerful data-gathering methods and analytical tools (e.g., Birnbaum et al, 2003;van Heerwaarden et al, 2011;de Schawe et al, 2013;Félix et al, 2014;Guerra-García et al, 2017;Mardonovich et al, 2019). Besides its evolutionary role in natural ecosystems, gene flow and introgression are an important evolutionary factor in crop-wild-weed complexes, the crop's primary gene pool (Harlan and de Wet, 1971).…”