engleski

Efficiency of Morphological Descriptors for Accession Identification in Basils (Ocimum L.)

The genus Ocimum L. (Lamiaceae) comprises 30 to 160 species of annual and perennial herbs and shrubs collectively called basil. The genus is characterized by high levels of both chemical and morphological variability and its taxonomy is complex for the occurrence of inter and intraspecific hybridisation. For the purpose of characterization of 65 Ocimum taxa, held in the Collection of Medicinal and Aromatic Plants of the Department of Seed Science and Technology, Faculty of Agriculture, University of Zagreb, Croatia, were analyzed according to the list of descriptors which enables accurate identification of different species, botanical varieties and cultivars. Analyzed taxa belong to O. americanum L., O. basilicum L., O. champechianum Mill., O. x citriodorum Vis., O. gratissimum L., O. kilimandscharicum Baker ex Gürke O. minimum L., O. tenuiflorum L., and O. selloi Benth. Phenotypic dissimilarities between paris of accessions were calculated and the UPGMA dendrogram was constructed. A number of clearly defined clusters and subclusters have been detected giving a good representation of traditional taxonomic relationships. To compare the efficiency of the morphological traits in accession identification the confussion probability and discriminating power of each trait was calculated. The independence between pairs of traits was assessed by contingency tables. A combination of five morphological traits (leaf shape, plant aroma, bush shape, leaf color, leaf blade position) was chosen based on discriminating power and mutual independence.

accession; basil; discriminating power; Ocimum; morphological traits

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