Genetic Diversity of Hybrid Dandelions and their Clone Distribution in Kanto Plain

Abstract

In the "Environmental Indicator Species Survey (Ministry of Environment 2001)", 85 percent of the plants morphologically identified as the introduced dandelions were found to be the hybrids. These hybrid dandelions were originated from the crosses between native and introduced dandelions. From the viewpoint of the environmental indicators, we tried to recognize the genetic structure of hybrid dandelions collected from Kanto plain using the nuclear DNA micro-satellite markers. Out of 263 tetraploid hybrids, 246 plants (93%) were found to be genetically identical. It was also shown that this dominant clone of tetraploid hybrids widely distributed in Kanto plain.