Amaranths are most economically important group of plants, including leafy vegetables and ornamentals. Six different accessions of the same species of Amaranth were distributed from various places all over the India like Maharashtra, Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh. Correct genotype identification is important to evaluate the genetic diversity of local Amaranthus, and for efficient weed control and containing high nutritional value, but is often difficult to identify, because of similar morphological characteristics among a variety within same species. Here in this work we studied the genetic diversity and phylogenetic relationships among six accessions of Amaranthus species from different geographic regions using the RAPD molecular markers. RAPD analyses have been carried out by using four arbitrary decamer primers. On the basis of RAPD data, accession IC 95609 (3), IC 35482 (5) and IC 95595 (10) were very close to each other as they share the same geographical region. Accessions IC 95609 (3) and IC 35482 (5) showed highest similarity (86%). From the RAPD data, an UPGMA dendrogram illustrated that high polymorphism is present due to their geographical distributions.

Keywords: Amaranthus, RAPD, genetic diversity, Phylogenetic analysis