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Diversity of Furcraea populations in Colombia: an approach to its harnessing in plant breeding programs

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Abstract

Furcraea spp. is a traditional and popular natural fibre used in rural areas of Central and South America for clothing and handcraft since ancient times. Recently, this crop has been used in the pharmaceutical and chemical industries. Therefore, it is necessary to quantify the standing genetic diversity and morphological variation. In this study, a total of 134 accessions of Furcraea spp. collected across 12 provinces of Colombia with different agro-ecologies were established ex situ in Rionegro, Colombia, and evaluated to understand its genetic variation. Twenty-three phenotypic traits (17 qualitative and 6 quantitative) were used to assess the morphological diversity through both descriptive statistics and multivariate analysis using multiple correspondence (MCA) and principal components analysis (PCA), respectively. All examined accessions showed variation through the studied variables. However, the Shannon–Weaver index revealed an average score of 0.57, indicating intermediate phenotypic diversity for the qualitative variables. MCA indicated that the qualitative variation among the accessions was mainly related to the shape of the spike and texture, and the shape and waxy condition of the leaves. PCA explains 72.7% of the total variation in the first two axes. For both analyses, accessions were grouped without a distinct and apparent geographical pattern. The length and width of the leaf and spine, and the shape of the spine were relevant to separate accessions. These results could be useful for germplasm management and pre-breeding programs aiming to enhance traits of interest.

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Data Availability

The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

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Funding

This work was supported by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development of Colombia (MADR in Spanish), through the research project "Development of recommendations for integrated management practices in Furcraea spp. and strategies for by-products uses in Colombia" which was developed by AGROSAVIA.

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  1. Corporación Colombiana de Investigación Agropecuaria, AGROSAVIA, Centro de Investigación La Selva. Km 5, vía Rionegro-Las Palmas, Sector Llanogrande, Rionegro, Colombia

    Manuel Guzman, Clara Medina, Luz Orozco & María Vargas

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  1. Manuel Guzman
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  2. Clara Medina
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  3. Luz Orozco
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Contributions

MG: Conceptualization, Formal analysis, Investigation, Writing—original draft, Writing—review and editing. CM: Conceptualization, Methodology, Investigation, Supervision, Funding acquisition, Project administration, Writing—review and editing. LO: Investigation, Writing—review and editing. MV: Methodology, Investigation, Writing—review and editing. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Manuel Guzman.

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Guzman, M., Medina, C., Orozco, L. et al. Diversity of Furcraea populations in Colombia: an approach to its harnessing in plant breeding programs. Genet Resour Crop Evol 70, 2115–2128 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10722-023-01562-3

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