Genetic diversity in Republic of Korea natural zoysiagrass ( <i>Zoysia</i> spp.) based on inter‐simple sequence repeat analysis

Abstract This study was conducted to identify genetic diversity and spatial genetic structure in natural populations of zoysiagrasses using inter‐simple sequence repeat markers for the purpose of establishing highly efficient measures for preserving zoysiagrass. The genetic diversity indices based on the Nei's gene diversity ( H ) and Shannon's information index ( I ) were 0.048 and 0.072 in site I and 0.024 and 0.034 in site II. Compared to site II, site I contained more diverse genotypes per unit area. The analysis of molecular variance showed that 56.2% of the genetic variations were attributed to variations among populations, while 43.8% were attributed to the variation within populations. It was deemed that the high rate of inter‐plot genetic variations reflected the species‐specific characteristics in reproduction mode. The spatial genetic structures of the zoysiagrasses based on the correlogram analysis indicated that genetically similar individuals were found within 2 m of each other in the Zoysia japonica site I, but genetically different when two genotypes were grown more than 3.5 m apart. On the other hand, there was a random distribution of individuals at all distances, and no distinct genetic colonies were formed in the Zoysia sinica site II. Results from this study demonstrated that for ex situ genetic conservation of zoysiagrasses, the sampling strategy should be considered in intervals of at least 2 m.