The study of Foraging initiation Trait loci gene Polymorphism in Iranian honey bee(Apis mellifera meda) colonies by using AFLP marker

Honeybee is a pollinator that has prominent role in agriculture products and nourishment for human. So, the most number of studies like genetic improvement were done on honeybee. Recent advances in knowledge of molecular genetics of bee emphasize the potential for using genetic markers to select favored traits. This research was done to determine polymorphism of loci of first foraging age (AFF) trait in Iranian honeybee (Apis mellifera meda). Two colonies with high production- long longevity and low production- short longevity were selected from 11th generation of “Iranian Breeding Honeybee Project”. In the high production colony, foraging initiation had started sooner (age of 9 33 day). Also‚ the length of foraging initiation period in comparison with low production colony (age of 12-29 day) was longer. Genetic polymorphism of the loci was assessed by using 4 primer pairs. PCR products were detected using polyacrylamide gel. 26 polymorphic alleles were observed using AFLP markers. Totally‚ the most amount of Shanon Index is related to E3M2-1 locus in low production population (0. 693) and also E M3-4 position in high production population (0. 693). Therefore‚ these two loci have shown most polymorphism. The least amount of Shanon Index is related to E6M3-5 locus in low production population (0. 156). The highest effective allele was belong to E3M3-4 position in high production colony and the lowest was related to E6M3-5 position in low production population. Heterozygosity was diverse between (0. 053) in E6M3-5 to (0. 05) in E3M2-1. Mean of (He) in low production colony was (0. 321) and in high production colony was (0. 324). Mean of Shanon Index were (0. 490) and (0. 491) respectively. Genetic variance between 2 populations was only ٪10. There was difference in production in the 2 populations but, genetic diversity is not very impressive. Genetic similarity in them may is because of using the small number of samples in this research.