Micropropagation of banana genetic resources adapted to the Argentine environment and generation of new variability for agronomic traits through somaclonal variation

Banana is a crop that generally presents low genetic variability. Hence, in vitro culture is used to obtain pathogen-free micropropagated plants. The objectives of this study were to perform micropropagation using meristem explants from 13 promising banana clones collected at farmers' fields in the Argentinean Formosa province, characterize the regenerated and the explant's donor plants using amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) profiles. evaluate the regenerated plants carrying molecular polymorphism and the non-regenerated plants by quantitative traits of agronomic value, and identify associations between the molecular and phenotypic variability. These objectives were motivated by the fact that regenerated individuals frequently exhibit somaclonal variation. Both univariate and multivariate analyses were used to assess the molecular and phenotypic data as well as their associations. Although only two different clones could be regenerated, the total number of micropropagated plants was high. These plants presented a wider range of molecular and phenotypic variability than the non-regenerated plants, and associations were found between molecular somaclonal variations and agronomic traits related to tolerance to black leaf streak, photosynthetic capacity and carbohydrate storage capacity.