CHARACTERIZATION OF ITS REGION FOR IDENTIFICATION AND DETERMINATION OF GENETIC RELATIONSHIP OF SOME SPECIES IN Dendrobium GENUS

Abstract

Dendrobium is a large genus in the orchid family in which many species is highly valueable due to their beauty or high medicinal properties. However, the species classification is often difficult because there are many similarities between species. In this study, ITS-based DNA barcode was used to analyze the genetic structure of 10 Dendrobium samples collected from different regions. Results showed that there is genetic diversity of 10 orchid samples in ITS region. Based on analysis by the Kimura 2- parameter model, the genetic distance between orchid samples ranged from 0.00 to 1.14. Through identification by BLAST, in ten orchid samples, one sample belongs to Dendrobium catenatum, one sample belongs to Dendrobium aphyllum and the remaining eight samples are identified as Dendrobium anosmum. Thus, the ITS region-based DNA barcoding holds great promise for identification and taxonomy as well as providing information on the genetic relationships between orchids species in the Dendrobium genus