Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 May 2008
‘Broccolo fiolaro’ (Brassica oleracea L. convar.Italica) is a typical vegetable produced in a restricted hill country area around Creazzo(Vicenza) in north-eastern Italy. The cultivation of this vegetable dates back severalcenturies ago, but a very few farms are still involved in the production.‘Broccolo fiolaro’ is a variety of broccoli highly valued for itsagronomic and organoleptic features.
Four ‘Broccolo fiolaro’ selections were characterized by simplesequence repeats (SSRs) molecular markers and compared with other five cultivatedvarieties of broccoli of the Italica group in order to reconstruct their genetic structureand evaluate the degree of similarity among and within populations. The analysis of 12 SSRpolymorphic loci pointed out a low genetic variability among the four ‘Broccolofiolaro’ selections. Moreover, the whole ‘Fiolaro’ groupshowed significant differentiation from the other broccoli cultivars and could be easilydistinguished by cluster analysis. An assignment test on ~30 genotyped plants randomlychosen from each broccoli population correctly recognized the proper accession 88% of thetime, proving this method to be useful for cultivar identification.