ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Plant Sci.
Sec. Functional and Applied Plant Genomics
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpls.2025.1666009
This article is part of the Research TopicPlant Genotyping: From Traditional Markers to Modern Technologies, Volume IIView all 11 articles
Comparative assessment of species identification methods for European Salicornia sources: A multifaceted approach employing morphology, nuclear DNA content, phylogenetic markers, RNA topology, and SSR fingerprinting
Provisionally accepted
- 1Leibniz Universitat Hannover, Hanover, Germany
- 2Universita degli Studi di Milano, Milan, Italy
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Accurate identification of Salicornia species is a fundamental prerequisite for their potential usability and domestication. This study utilized a multifaceted methodological approach integrating morphological, cytogenetic, and molecular techniques to identify species from available European Salicornia sources. The following methods were compared: nuclear DNA content analysis; application of marker-based DNA barcoding via four common Salicornia markers; investigations of RNA topologies of these marker sequences by predicting theoretical secondary structures; utilization of diagnostic single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) positions within the external transcribed spacer (ETS) marker sequences for European Salicornia taxa; comparison of three promising microsatellite (SSR) markers regarding their ability to differentiate Salicornia subspecies; and evaluation of morphological data on habitus and flower characteristics utilizing a Salicornia identification key. The results demonstrate that ETS marker analysis offers reliable and cost-effective species determination, with SNP comparisons being more user friendly than phylogenetic trees are, and microsatellite markers can be differentiated down to the subspecies level via fragment length differences. However, microsatellite analysis alone is not suitable for primary species identification. DNA content can provide a rough estimation of potential species and is already more reliable than morphological methods. The differentiation among species is crucial for creating transparency for farmers and hat formatiert: Deutsch (Deutschland) hat formatiert: Französisch (Frankreich) Feldfunktion geändert hat formatiert: Französisch (Frankreich) hat formatiert: Französisch (Frankreich) consumers and for initiating breeding processes, particularly within the context of frequent misidentification.
Keywords: microsatellite marker fingerprinting, Molecular markers, morphology, Nuclear DNA content, Salicornia, species delimitation
Received: 14 Jul 2025; Accepted: 11 Aug 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Fussy, Austoni, Winkelmann and Papenbrock. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Jutta Papenbrock, Leibniz Universitat Hannover, Hanover, Germany
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