Feasibility of Cultivating Artemisia afra Jacq. ex Willd in Côte d’Ivoire (Daloa) and Evaluation of Its Genetic Diversity on the Basis of Phenotypic Variations

In the southern African regions, Artemisia afra Jacq. ex Willd is one of the most popular and commonly used herbal medicines. In recent years, A. afra has received much attention from the scientific community and its use is being investigated in the modern diseases like diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, cancer, and respiratory diseases. This growth in popularity could pose a threat to the species due to intensive harvesting. Indeed, overexploitation is a growing problem for many medicinal species in Africa. To sustain the production and availability of A. afra, cultivation seems to be a good strategy and an alternative to collecting in the wild. Unlike A. annua L. (source of artemisinin), little information is available on the cultivation of A. Afra in West African countries. In this study, feasibility of cultivating A. Afra in Côte d’Ivoire was evaluated and the extent of its genetic diversity was assessed based on morphological variations. A. annua L. was used as control. The result showed for A. afra, 30 and 28.02% nursery and field mortality respectively, and 27.77% and 0% for A. annua. A. annua showed faster growth and development kinetics during the first 90 days after field transplantation. A. annua was relatively earlier (83 days to flowering on average) than A. afra (207.20 days to flowering on average). Contrary to A. annua, A. afra was sterile and did not give viable seeds, which poses a major problem of acclimatization in the environmental conditions of Côte d’Ivoire. Assessment of morphological traits revealed significant variations within and between species. Multivariate analysis showed important intra and interspecific genetic diversity. The plants of A. afra and A. annua were grouped separately and six major clusters were found: two clusters in A. annua (cluster I and II) and four clusters in A. afra (cluster III, IV, V and VI). These results show that further studies need to be considered to make cultivation of A. afra possible in Côte d’Ivoire with superior and genetically stable genotypes. Keywords: Artemisia afra, Artemisia annua, genetic diversity, cultivation DOI: 10.7176/JBAH/10-24-04 Publication date: December 31st 202

Multivariate Analysis of Genetic Diversity Among Okra (Abelmoschus spp.) Cultivars Grown in Côte d’Ivoire Based on Agro-morphological Traits

Crop improvement for sustainable agriculture requires information about the genetic variability of traits that helps identify suitable parents. This study was conducted to investigate the extent of genetic diversity among 12 okra cultivars grown and marketed in Côte d’Ivoire, using 12 quantitative and 11 qualitative agro-morphological traits. A Randomized Complete Block Design (RCBD) with five replications and two multivariate techniques, viz. principal component analysis (PCA) and cluster analysis (CA) were used. The okra cultivars evaluated showed wide variation in quantitative traits but minimal variation in qualitative traits except for leaf and fruit shapes. The first two PCs explained 70.489% variation and identify seven traits (day to flowering, stem diameter, plant height, number of fruit ridges, number of fruits per plant, fruit yield and number of seeds per fruit) that play a prominent role in the differentiation of the okra cultivars, and therefore could be used as good criteria for selection in okra improvement. PCA and CA grouped the total cultivars into three divergent clusters exhibiting specific characteristics: vigor and good yield for cluster I, short plants and earliness for cluster II and high yield for cluster III. The results of this investigation indicated that substantial variability was present in the okra studied. The cultivars of the divergent clusters constitute interesting okra genetic resources that can be used as a parental material for further breeding. Keywords: genetic diversity, okra, Abelmoschus caillei, Abelmoschus esculentus, principal component analysis, cluster analysis DOI: 10.7176/JBAH/10-22-03 Publication date: November 30th 202

Phenotypic Characterization and Multivariate Analysis of Fifteen Maize Lines developed by Induced Mutation in Daloa (Côte d’Ivoire)

In Côte d'Ivoire, maize is an important staple food for a large part of the population. However, its culture faces many constraints related to soil degradation, climate change and genetic degeneration of cultivated varieties. In order to create new varieties adapted to these constraints, mutant maize Lines have been developed using the gamma radiation technique. The present study aims to phenotyping 15 mutant Lines from the sixth generation of self-pollination, in order to characterize them and to give information on their genetic diversity. For this, an experiment in a randomized complete block design with three replications was conducted. Thirteen traits were evaluated and they showed wide variation not only between the mutant Lines but also between them and the non-irradiated control. Multivariate analysis structured this variability into five distinct groups with specific traits. The interest of the revealed traits and the future use of these mutant Lines are discussed. Keywords: maize, gamma radiation, induce mutation, phenotypic characterization DOI: 10.7176/JBAH/13-18-05 Publication date:December 31st 202

Effect of GammaRay in the Progeny of Trispecific Hybrid [(Gossypium hirsutum x G. raimondii)² x G. sturtianum]

The objective of this study is to analyse the possibilities of fixing in the progeny of the [(Gossypium hirsutum x G. raimondii)² x G. sturtianum] (HRS) trispecies hybrid, the glandless-seed and glanded-plant trait. The expression of the character was analysed in progenies obtained by selfing the HRS BC2S5/9/6/1/51/15 genetic stock. This character is controlled by one or more genes located on introgressed chromosome fragments of G. sturtianum. These foreign DNA fragments seem also carriers of gametes terminators genes on the same chromosome fragments and there would be a possible existence of negative interactions between some of the introgressed G. sturtianum alleles and the G. hirsutum genetic background inducing post-zygotic mortality. In order to break existing lethal links, some of the studied seeds were treated with 15 krad of gamma radiation. The transfer of G. sturtianum chromosome fragments introgressed stocks was assessed using ten mapped SSR markers, carried out on 78 plants HRS ‘BC2S6’. Gamma irradiation used to overcome lethality in HRS hybrid did not give expected results in M2 because of high rate of abortion observed in HRS ‘BC2S6’ seeds. However, gamma ray did not induce the appearance of chimeric tissues in the HRS ‘BC2S5/9/6/1/51/15’ in M1 plants. Moreover, the notable fertility improvement observed for some plants issued from irradiated seeds constitutes a clue of the achievement of favourables recombinations due to the gamma ray treatment. The perspectives opened by the results obtained for the stabilization of the glandless-seed and glanded-plant trait in a G. hirsutum commercial variety are discussed

Active transposable elements recover species boundaries and geographic structure in Madagascan coffee species

International audienceThe completion of the genome assembly for the economically important coffee plant Coffea canephora (Rubiaceae) has allowed the use of bioinformatic tools to identify and characterize a diverse array of transposable elements (TEs), which can be used in evolutionary studies of the genus. An overview of the copy number and location within the C. canephora genome of four TEs is presented. These are tested for their use as molecular markers to unravel the evolutionary history of the Millotii Complex, a group of six wild coffee (Coffea) species native to Madagascar. Two TEs from the Gypsy superfamily successfully recovered some species boundaries and geographic structure among samples, whereas a TE from the Copia superfamily did not. Notably, species occurring in evergreen moist forests of eastern and southeastern Madagascawere divergent with respect to species in other habitats and regions. Our results suggest that the peak of transpositional activity of the Gypsy and Copia TEs occurred, respectively, before and after the speciation events of the tested Madagascan species. We conclude that the utilization of active TEs has considerable potential to unravel the evolutionary history and delimitation of closely related Coffea species. However, the selection of TE needs to be experimentally tested, since each element has its own evolutionary history. Different TEs with similar copy number in a given species can render different dendrograms; thus copy number is not a good selection criterion to attain phylogenetic resolution