MOLECULAR VARIABILITY OF ROSA DAMASCENA MILL. GROWING IN TAIF REGION OF SAUDI ARABIA

Approximately 700 bp of the cpDNA maturaseK gene were amplified and sequenced for Rosa damascena inhabiting four distant localities of the western Saudi Arabia in order to address their genetic framework and origin. The different samples acquired identical gene sequence. The obtained sequences were compared with their counterparts from greenhouse R. damascena samples and other related taxa by using maximum-parsimony, neighbor-joining and maximum-likelihood methods. One tree was executed in which all samples showed sister relationship to greenhouse samples and to R. moschata. Some other greenhouse samples and R. gallica were shown to be out of this cluster, but they were sister to their Glade. It is most likely that the R. damascena possibly originated from R. moschata and/or hybridization of R. moschata x R. gallica.