Abstract
The environmental and cultural diversity of Southwest Europe favored the diversification of crops arriving from America, giving rise to many new landraces. Gastronomy played an important role in their evolution. These landraces would later be substituted by genetically improved varieties, but some, like the Ganxet bean cultivated in the northeast of the Iberian Peninsula, have survived thanks to their superior sensory qualities. The distinctive flat and extremely hooked shape of the Ganxet seed has facilitated the detection of altered germplasm yielding less hooked seeds. In the present study, the use of RAPD and ALFP markers has enabled us to estimate the variability of Ganxet entries, determine the sources of introgression, and discuss the dangers menacing European landraces with superior organoleptic qualities. The low variability among prototypical Ganxet lines increased as less and less hooked materials were included in the analysis. The more productive Great Northern-type germplasm was found to be the main source of introgression in Ganxet. Successful introgression of more productive improved germplasm into landraces is probably a general phenomenon. So, in the absence of morphological markers, objective studies of the organoleptic value of landraces and thorough description using genetic markers become essential to ensure that the growing commercial interest in superior landraces is not reduced to a mere marketing operation.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Beebe SE, Ochoa I, Skroch P, Nienhuis J, Tivang J (1995) Genetic diversity among common bean breeding lines developed for Central America. Crop Sci 35:1178–1183
Benham JJ (2001) Genographer, version 1.6.0. Montana State University, USA
Bio-Rad Laboratories (2002) Quantity One (Quantification software). User guide for version 4.4. Windows and Macintosh. The Discovery Series, Hercules, CA, USA
Bosch L, Casañas F, Sánchez E, Pujola M, Nuez F (1998) Selection L67, a Pure Line with True Seed Type of the Ganxet Common Bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) inbred. HortScience 33:905–906
Brandolini GA (1968) European races of corn. Proc. 24th. Annu. Corn and Sorgum Res. Conf. Washington D.C. ASTA Publ No. 24:36–48
Casañas F, Bosch L, Sánchez E, Romero del Castillo R, Valero J, Baldi M, Mestres J, Nuez F (1998) Características de la alubia Ganxet (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) y acciones para su conservación. Investigación Agraria: Prod. Prot. Veg. 13:43–55
Casañas F, Bosch L, Pujolà M, Sánchez E, Sorribas X, Baldi M, Nuez F (1999) Characteristics of a common bean landrace (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) of great culinary value and selection of a commercial inbred line. J Sci Food Agric 79:693–698
Cattan-Toupance I, Michalakis Y, Neema C (1998) Genetic structure of wild bean populations in their South-Andean centre of origin. Theor Appl Genet 96:844–851
Dice LR (1945) Measures of the amount of ecologic association between species. Ecology 26:297–302
Doyle JJ, Doyle DL (1990) Isolation of plant DNA from fresh tissue. Focus 12:1315
Edwards RJ, Leng ER (1965) Classification of some indigenous maize collections from southern and southeastern Europe. Euphytica 14:161–169
Eichenberger K, Gugerli F, Schneller JJ (2000) Morphological and molecular diversity of Swiss common bean cultivars (Phaseolus vulgaris L., Fabaceae) and their origin. Bot Helv 110:61–77
Esquinas-Alcázar J, Nuez F (1995) Situación taxonómica, domesticación y difusión del tomate. In: Nuez F (ed) El Cultivo del Tomate, Mundiprensa, pp 15–42
Felsenstein J (1994) Phylogeny Inference Package (PHYLIP), version 3.6. University of Washington, Seattle, USA
Freyre R, Rios R, Guzmán L, Debouck DG, Gepts P (1996) Ecogeograhic distribution of Phaseolus spp. (Fabaceae) in Bolivia. Econ Bot 50:195–215
Graham GC, Henry RJ, Redden RJ (1994) Identification of navy bean varieties using random amplification of polymorphic DNA. Aust J Exp Agric 34:1173–1176
Haley SD, Miklas PN, Afanador L, Kelly JD (1994) Random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) marker variability between and within gene pools of common bean. J Amer Soc Hort Sci 119:122–125
Lanteri S, Acquadro A, Quagliotti L, Portis E (2003) PAPD and AFLP assessment of genetic variation in a landrace of pepper (Capsicum annum L.) grown in North-West Italy. Genet Resour Crop Evol 50:723–735
Lioi L, Piergiovanni AR, Pignone D, Puglisi S, Santantonio M, Sonnante G (2005) Genetic diversity of some surviving on-farm Italian common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) landraces. Plant Breed 124:576–581
Miklas PN, Kelly JD (1992) Identifying bean DNA polymorphisms using the Polymerase Chain Reaction. Ann Rep Bean Improv Coop 35:21–22
Negri V, Tosti N (2002) Genetic diversity within a common bean landrace of potential economic value: its relevance for on-farm conservation and product certification. J Genet Breed 56:113–118
Nowosielski J, Podyma W (2001) Molecular research on genetic diversity of Polish varieties and Landraces of Phaseolus. In: Swiecicki W, Naganowska B, Wolko B (eds) Broad variation and precise characterization limitation for the future. Proceedings of the XVIth EUCARPIA Genetic Resources Section workshop, Poznan, Poland, May 2001, pp 247–252
Page RDM (1996) TREEVIEW: an application to display phylogenetic trees on personal computers. Comput Appl Biosci 12: 357–358
Piergiovanni A, Taranto G, Losavio FP, Pignone D (2006) Common bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) landraces from Abruzzo and Lazio regions (Central Italy). Genet Resour Crop Evol 53:313–322
Pujolà M, Casañas F, Bosch L, Almirall A, Sánchez E, Nuez F (2004) Creaminess and chemical composition in dry beans (Phaseolus vulgaris L.): the roles of protein and starch. Proceedings of the 5th European Conference on Grain Legumes: legumes for the benefit of agriculture nutrition and environment, Dijon. n. 397
Rebourg C, Gouesnard B, Charcosset A (2001) Large scale molecular analysis of traditional European maize populations. Relationships with morphological variation. Heredity 86:574–587
Sánchez E (2003) Variabilitat de la mongeta Ganxet (Phaseolus vulgaris L.): determinació de tipologies i selecció de línies comercials. Ph. D. Thesis, Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona. Also available in <http://tdx.cesca.es/TESIS_UB/AVAILABLE/ TDX-0527104–115236//TESI.pdf>
Santalla M, Rodiño AP, de Ron AM (2002) Allozyme evidence supporting southwestern Europe as a secondary center of genetic diversity for the common bean. Theor Appl Genet 104:934–944
Skroch PW, Nienhuis J (1995) Qualitative and quantitative characterization of RAPD variation among snap bean (Phaseolus vulgaris) genotypes. Theor Appl Genet 91:1078–1085
Skroch PW, Nienhuis J, Beebe S, Tohme J, Pedraza F (1998) Comparison of Mexican common bean (P. vulgaris L.) core and reserve germplasm collections. Crop Sci 38:488–496
Sicard D, Nanni L, Porfiri O, Bulfon D, Papa R (2005) Genetic diversity of Phaseolus vulgaris L. and Phaseolus coccineus L. landraces in central Italy. Plant Breed 124:464–472
Sokal RR, Michener CD (1958) A statistical method for evaluating systematic relationships. Univ Kans Sci Bull 38:1409–1438
Tosti N, Negri V (2005) On-going on-farm microevolutionary processes in neighbouring cowpea landraces revealed by molecular markers. Theor Appl Genet 110:1275–1283
Vellvé R (1992) Saving the seed: genetic diversity and European agriculture. Earthscan Publ, London, UK
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Sánchez, E., Sifres, A., Casañas, F. et al. The endangered future of organoleptically prestigious European landraces: Ganxet bean (Phaseolus vulgaris L.) as an example of a crop originating in the Americas. Genet Resour Crop Evol 55, 45–52 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10722-007-9213-x
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10722-007-9213-x