Dados genéticos de plantas da caatinga: investigação de dados disponíveis com enfoque em marcadores moleculares para filogenia e em elementos transponíveis

Abstract

Caatinga is one of the main Brazilian biomes and occupies the largest territorial extension of the Northeast region, with a semi-arid climate. The characterization of this biome allowed the emergence of a great genetic diversity of plant species, woody and non-woody plants comprising a large part of plant biodiversity. However, the irregularity of the rains and the scarcity of water are not the only challenges faced by the vegetation, deforestation is one of the main problems that afflict the flora of the caatinga, leading to the modification of the native vegetation and threatens the species that today are considered vulnerable. or in danger of extinction. Given this scenario, new technologies for DNA sequencing of plants and computational bioinformatics programs become an important tool to meet the need for research aimed at the conservation and reproduction of native species. Therefore, in this work, we searched public databases of nucleotide sequences for available genetic information on a sample of 20 species that had a greater distribution in the phytogeographic domain of the caatinga. This search was carried out using two approaches, molecular markers and transposable elements. The results show that for these species there are no fully sequenced genomes but there are data for molecular markers that are essential for studies of numerous species, both in phylogenetic and phylogeographic approaches. As for the transposable elements, there are no sequences available for the plants under study. There are, however, complete genomes of plants from the same caatinga plant families that can, in a comparative genomics study, serve as a basis for obtaining close sequences to be used in the design of oligonucelitodes for PCR in future research with transposable elements. A preliminary analysis with molecular markers of the matK gene allowed the obtaining of phylogenetic trees in the analysis of a possible correlation between these caatinga plant genomes with the response to the biotic and abiotic stresses to which these plants are subjected.