Determination of genome size and chromosome ploidy of selected taxa from Prunus armeniaca by flow cytometry

The assessment of plant genome size is important in many research fields, including crop improvement and molecular genetics. However, studies on the genome size of Prunus armeniaca is limited. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the differences in the genome size of P. armeniaca in different geographic ecological groups and estimate the ranges in genome size. Nuclear suspension of P. armeniaca was prepared by Marie's isolation buffer and propidium iodide fluorescent dye. The genome size of 51, 60, 11 and 2 accessions from the Central Asian Ecological Group, Dzhungar-ili Ecological Group, North China Ecological Group and European Ecological Group, respectively, were assessed by flow cytometry, and the levels of ploidy were evaluated. There were no polyploids from different ecological groups of P. armeniaca; all accessions were diploids. The genome size of P. armeniaca varied from 0.590 to 0.708 pg, and the average genome size was 0.637 pg. The European Ecological Group had the largest genome size (0.661 pg/2C), which was the only group significantly different in size from the Central Asian, North China and Dzhungar-ili Ecological Group (P = 0.05), while the difference in genome size among these three ecological groups was small. There was no significant difference in genome size between different populations of wild accessions, and there was no significant correlation with longitude, latitude and altitude. The variation in the genome size of P. armeniaca was only 2.33%, and there was low intraspecies variation among the studied groups; the genome size of P. armeniaca is highly stable.