Studies on bacterial blight of pomegranate caused by Xanthomonas axonopodis PV. punicae

Pomeg1ranate (Punica granatum L.) often suffers from bacterial blight, caused by Xanthomonas axonopodis pv. punicae. Five isolates of pathogenic bacteria were collected from nearby areas viz. Nevasa, Shrirampur, Sangamner, Shirdi and Akole, belonging to Ahmednagar of Maharashtra state, India. Genetic diversity was studied among the five isolates of Xanthomonas axonopodis pv. punicae by using 07 RAPD primers, out of which 03 primers produces total 14 scorable bands with an average of 4.6 bands per primer. Out of 14 bands, 12 bands were found to be polymorphic and level of polymorphism was 86.66%. The Jaccard's similarity coefficient showed that the isolate Nevasa (Xap I) had higher value of similarity coefficient (0.89) with Shrirampur ( Xap II), whereas Sangamner (Xap III) showed lower value of similarity coefficient (0.21) with Akole ( Xap V). The cluster analysis, based on similarity coefficients, divided five isolates into two major and two sub clusters. High level of genomic diversity among the isolates was observed even though those were within the same geographical regions.