Investigating the Genetic Diversity of Different Iranian Saffron Accessions Using Multivariate Statistical Methods

Hoseinzadeh, Leyla; Salami, Alireza; Ebrahimi, Mohsen; Izady, Ali

doi:10.22059/jci.2025.378342.2890

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

¹ Ph.D. candidate of Genetics and Plant Breeding , Department of Agronomy sciences and Plant Breeding, College of Aburaihan, University of Tehran, Pakdasht, Iran.

² Professor, Department of Horticultural Science and Landscape Architecture, College of Agriculture and Natural Resources, University of Tehran, Karaj, Iran.

³ Associate Professor, Department of Agronomy Sciences and Plant Breeding, College of Aburaihan, University of Tehran, Pakdasht, Iran.

https://doi.org/10.22059/jci.2025.378342.2890

Abstract

Objective: Saffron (Crocus sativus L.) is a perennial, sterile, and triploid plant. Moreover, dried saffron stigmas have many uses in the food and medicine industry. Saffron plants propagate by corms due to sterility. Therefore, it has limited diversity and a poor plant breeding background, leading to genetic erosion. As a result, being under severe risk of genetic erosion is an obstacle to the breeding and production of saffron. The objective of this study was to investigate the diversity among saffron ecotypes, to evaluate the correlation between morphological traits and the amounts of secondary metabolites, and to classify the ecotypes.
Methods: A complete randomized block design with two replications in three harvests has been conducted to investigate the biological diversity of 22 saffron accessions collected from different regions of Iran at the Tehran University research farm, Mohamadshahr, Alborz, Iran. The most important morphological traits and amount of secondary metabolites, including crocin, picrocrocin, and safranal, were measured by using high-performance liquid chromatography.
Results: Analysis of variance showed significant differences among accessions for studied traits in three consecutive harvests. Qaenat accession had the highest means of obtaining the most morphological characteristics. The factor analysis based on PCA showed that the two first components explained 97 percent of the total variance of traits. The traits of leaf length, stigma fresh weight, stigma length, and safranal in the first component and picrocrocin, crocin, and petal length in the second component had the most positive role in justifying 66.7 percent of the total variance, respectively. Based on cluster analysis, accessions were divided into five clusters. The Qaenat and Firdos 16 accessions had the most genetic similarity, and the Qaenat and Arak accessions had the farthest genetic distance. Moreover, the studied traits are divided into three clusters, so that the amount of crocin and picrocrocin and petal length are in the first category, the amount of safranal, the length of leaf, length of stigma and length of flower, fresh weight of flower and stigma are in the second category, and the final yield, the total number of flowers, and dry weight of stigma are in the third category.
Conclusion: Although studied accessions were cultivated and preserved in the same geographical environment, they had significant differences at morphological and phytochemical levels. Therefore, it can be concluded that the origin of the observed diversity is the result of the existence of diversity at the genome, transcriptome, or epigenome levels.

Keywords

References

امیریان، فاطمه؛ مصطفایی، علی و کارگر، سیدمحمدعلی (۱۳۹۹). بررسی تنوع ژنتیکی صفات رویشی اکوتیپ‌های زعفران خوراکی (Crocus sativus L.) تحت تنش سرما. نشریه پژوهش‌های زعفران، ۸(۲)، ۱۹۱-۲۰۶.

بیات، مهدی؛ امیرنیا، رضا؛ تاجبخش، مهدی , تانیولاچ، بهاتین (۱۳۹۵). ارزیابی تنوع ژنتیکی زعفران (Crocus sativus L.) با استفاده از نشانگرهای مولکولی iPBS و SSR. نشریه پژوهش‌های زعفران، ۴(۱)، ۱۰۳-۱۱۹.

Agayev, Y. M. O., Fernandez, J. A., & Zarifi, E. (2009). Clonal selection of saffron (Crocus sativus L.): the first optimistic experimental results. Euphytica, 169, 81-99.

Amiriyan, F., Mostafaie, A., & Seyyed Mohammad Ali, K. (2020). The Investigation of Genetic Diversity of Saffron (Crocus sativus L.) Ecotypes Traits under Chilling Stress. Journal of Saffron Research, 8 (2), 191-206. (In Persian).

Baghalian, K., Sheshtamand, M. S., & Jamshidi, A. H. (2010). Genetic variation and heritability of agro-morphological and phytochemical traits in Iranian saffron (Crocus sativus L.) populations. Industrial Crops and Products, 31(2), 401-406.

Bayat, M., Amir Niya, R., Taj Bakhsh, M., & Tanyvlach, B. (2016). Genetic Diversity of Saffron (Crocus sativus L.) using iPBS and SSR Molecular Markers. Journal of Saffron Research, 4(1), 103-119. (in Persian).

Bolhasani, A., Bathaie, S. Z., Yavari, I., Moosavi-Movahedi, A. A., & Ghaffari, M. (2005). Separation and purification of some components. Asian Journal of Chemistry, 17(2), 725-729.

Bukhari, S. I., Din, I., Grewal, S., & Dhar, M. K. (2018). Antiproliferative effect of saffron and its constituents on different cancerous cell lines. Pharmacognosy Research, 10(3).

Busconi, M., Colli, L., Sánchez, R. A., Santaella, M., De-Los-Mozos Pascual, M., Santana, O., ... & Fernandez, J. A. (2015). AFLP and MS-AFLP analysis of the variation within saffron crocus (Crocus sativus L.) germplasm. PloS one, 10(4), e0123434.

Cardone, L., Candido, V., Castronuovo, D., Perniola, M., & Cicco, N. (2021). Comparing annual and biennial crop cycle on the growth, yield and quality of saffron using three corm dimensions. Scientia Horticulturae, 288, 110393.

Cardone, L., Castronuovo, D., Perniola, M., Cicco, N., Molina, R. V., Renau-Morata, B., ... & Candido, V. (2021). Crocus sativus L. Ecotypes from Mediterranean countries: Phenological, morpho-productive, qualitative and genetic traits. Agronomy, 11(3), 551.

Casas-Catalán, M. J., & Doménech-Carbó, M. T. (2005). Identification of natural dyes used in works of art by pyrolysis–gas chromatography/mass spectrometry combined with in situ trimethylsilylation. Analytical and Bioanalytical Chemistry, 382, 259-268.

Fernández, J. A., Santana, O., Guardiola, J. L., Molina, R. V., Heslop-Harrison, P., Borbely, G., ... & De-Los-Mozos-Pascual, M. (2011). The world saffron and Crocus collection: strategies for establishment, management, characterisation and utilisation. Genetic Resources and Crop Evolution, 58, 125-137.

Fiore, A., Pizzichini, D., Diretto, G., Scossa, F., & Spanò, L. (2010). Genomics and transcriptomics of saffron: new tools to unravel the secrets of an attractive spice. The Editor, 25, 1-14.

Gresta, F., Avola, G., Lombardo, G. M., Siracusa, L., & Ruberto, G. (2009). Analysis of flowering, stigmas yield and qualitative traits of saffron (Crocus sativus L.) as affected by environmental conditions. Scientia Horticulturae, 119(3), 320-324.

Gresta, F., Lombardo, G. M., & Avola, G. (2009, May). Saffron stigmas production as affected by soil texture. In III International Symposium on Saffron: Forthcoming Challenges in Cultivation, Research and Economics 850 (pp. 149-152).

Hailu, F., Merker, A., Belay, G., & Johansson, E. (2006). Multivariate analysis of diversity of tetraploid wheat germplasm from Ethiopia. Genetic Resources and Crop Evolution, 53, 1089-1098.

Izadpanah, F. A., Kalantari, S. A., Hassani, M. E. B., Naghavi, M. R. C., & Shokrpoura, M. (2015). Molecular and morphological variation in some Iranian saffron (Crocus sativus L.) accessions. Genetika, 47(2), 711-722.

Jin, R. L., Qiao, Z. P., Zhou, S. D., Ye, Y. L., & Zhou, J. X. (1986). Investigation of saffron preparations by thin layer chromatography. Journal of Nanjing College of Pharmacy, 17, 247.

Kanakis, C. D., Daferera, D. J., Tarantilis, P. A., & Polissiou, M. G. (2004). Qualitative determination of volatile compounds and quantitative evaluation of safranal and 4-hydroxy-2, 6, 6-trimethyl-1-cyclohexene-1-carboxaldehyde (HTCC) in Greek saffron. Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, 52(14), 4515-4521.

Kothari, D., Thakur, R., & Kumar, R. (2021). Saffron (Crocus sativus L.): Gold of the spices A comprehensive review. Horticulture, Environment, and Biotechnology, 62(5), 661-677.

Lage, M., & Cantrell, C. L. (2009). Quantification of saffron (Crocus sativus L.) metabolites crocins, picrocrocin and safranal for quality determination of the spice grown under different environmental Moroccan conditions. Scientia Horticulturae, 121(3), 366-373.

Li, C. Y., & Wu, T. S. (2002). Constituents of the stigmas of crocus s ativus and their tyrosinase inhibitory activity. Journal of Natural Products, 65(10), 1452-1456.

Lozano, P., Castellar, M. R., Simancas, M. J., & Iborra, J. L. (1999). A quantitative high-performance liquid chromatographic method to analyse commercial saffron (Crocus sativus L.) products. Journal of Chromatography, 830(2), 477-483.

Lozano, P., Delgado, D., Gomez, D., Rubio, M., & Iborra, J. L. (2000). A non-destructive method to determine the safranal content of saffron (Crocus sativus L.) by supercritical carbon dioxide extraction combined with high-performance liquid chromatography and gas chromatography. Journal of Biochemical and Biophysical Methods, 43(1-3), 367-378.

Majidi, M. M., Mirlohi, A., & Amini, F. (2009). Genetic variation, heritability and correlations of agro-morphological traits in tall fescue (Festuca arundinacea Schreb.). Euphytica, 167(3), 323-331.

Mir, M. A., Mansoor, S., Sugapriya, M., Alyemeni, M. N., Wijaya, L., & Ahmad, P. (2021). Deciphering genetic diversity analysis of saffron (Crocus sativus L.) using RAPD and ISSR markers. Saudi Journal of Biological Sciences, 28(2), 1308-1317.

Nemati, Z., Mardi, M., Majidan, P., Zeinalabedini, M., Pirseyedi, S. M., & Baharodi, M. (2014). Saffron (Crocus sativus L.), a monomorphic or polymorphic species? Spanish Journal of Agricultural Research, 12(3), 753-762.

Nemati, Z., Zeinalabedini, M., Mardi, M., Pirseyediand, S. M., Marashi, S. H., & Khayam Nekoui, S. M. (2012). Isolation and characterization of a first set of polymorphic microsatellite markers in saffron, Crocus sativus (Iridaceae). American Journal of Botany, 99(9), e340-e343.

Pardo, J., Fernández, J. A., & Gomez, L. G. (2003, October). Development of molecular markers for origin determination in saffron. In I International Symposium on Saffron Biology and Biotechnology 650 (pp. 95-98).

Romesburg, C. (2004). Cluster analysis for researchers. Lulu. com.

Salami, S. A., & Husaini, A. M. (2022). Genetic Mapping and Molecular Markers in Saffron. In The Saffron Genome (pp. 83-94). Cham: Springer International Publishing.

Salami, S. A., & Husaini, A. M. (2022). SaffronOMICS: Novel Approaches Toward Putting Saffron Data at Work. In The Saffron Genome (pp. 43-62). Cham: Springer International Publishing.

Shahi, T., Assadpour, E., & Jafari, S. M. (2016). Main chemical compounds and pharmacological activities of stigmas and tepals of ‘red gold’; saffron. Trends in Food Science & Technology, 58, 69-78.

Shokrpour, M., Abedi, Z., Kalantari, S., & Salami, S. A. (2017). Study of genetic variation in some Iranian saffron accessions using molecular markers of RAPD and ISSR.

Singer, J. D. (1998). Using SAS PROC MIXED to fit multilevel models, hierarchical models, and individual growth models. Journal of Educational and Behavioral Statistics, 23(4), 323-355.

Soheilivand, S., Agayev, Y. M., Shakib, A. M., Fathi, M., & Rezvani, E. (2006, October). Comparison of diversity in flowering rate of two saffron (Crocus sativus) populations of Iran. In II International Symposium on Saffron Biology and Technology 739 (pp. 303-306).

Straubinger, M., Bau, B., Eckstein, S., Fink, M., & Winterhalter, P. (1998). Identification of Novel Glycosidic Aroma Precursors in Saffron (Crocus s ativus L.). Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, 46(8), 3238-3243.

Tarantilis, P. A., & Polissiou, M. G. (1997). Isolation and identification of the aroma components from saffron (Crocus sativus). Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, 45(2), 459-462.

Tarantilis, P. A., Tsoupras, G., & Polissiou, M. (1995). Determination of saffron (Crocus sativus L.) components in crude plant extract using high-performance liquid chromatography-UV-visible photodiode-array detection-mass spectrometry. Journal of Chromatography A, 699(1-2), 107-118.

Vahedi, M., Kabiri, M., Salami, S. A., Rezadoost, H., Mirzaie, M., & Kanani, M. R. (2018). Quantitative HPLC-based metabolomics of some Iranian saffron (Crocus sativus L.) accessions. Industrial Crops and Products, 118, 26-29.

Yao, L., Guo, S., Wang, H., Feng, T., Sun, M., Song, S., & Hou, F. (2022). Volatile fingerprints of different parts of Chongming saffron (Crocus sativus) flowers by headspace‐gas chromatography‐ion mobility spectrometry and in vitro bioactive properties of the saffron tepals. Journal of Food Science, 87(10), 4491-4503.

Yeo, I. K., & Johnson, R. A. (2000). A new family of power transformations to improve normality or symmetry. Biometrika, 87(4), 954-959.

Zanier, R., & Caiola, M. G. (2000). Self-incompatibility mechanisms in the Crocus sativus aggregate (Iridaceae): a preliminary investigation. Annali di Botanica, 58.

Zareena, A. V., Variyar, P. S., Gholap, A. S., & Bongirwar, D. R. (2001). Chemical investigation of gamma-irradiated saffron (Crocus sativus L.). Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, 49(2), 687-691.

Journal of Crops Improvement

Investigating the Genetic Diversity of Different Iranian Saffron Accessions Using Multivariate Statistical Methods

References

References

Volume 27, Issue 1
March 2025
Pages 69-89

Investigating the Genetic Diversity of Different Iranian Saffron Accessions Using Multivariate Statistical Methods

References

References

Volume 27, Issue 1March 2025Pages 69-89

Volume 27, Issue 1
March 2025
Pages 69-89