Genetic diversity and chemical profiling of different populations of Convolvulus pluricaulis (convolvulaceae): an important herb of ayurvedic medicine

Convolvulus pluricaulis Choisy, commonly known as “Shankhpushpi”, is an ayurvedic medicinal plant recommended as a brain tonic to promote intellect and memory, eliminate nervous disorders and to treat hypertension. Because of increasing demand of the drug, this plant species has been over-exploited. As a consequence, many unrelated plants are being sold by the crude drug dealers in India in the name of “Shankhpushpi”. Information on its existing gene pool is currently lacking. We developed molecular (Random Amplification of Polymorphic DNA) and chemical (high performance liquid chromatography) markers that could distinguish the genuine plant species from its adulterants. Molecular characterization confirmed higher genetic variation at inter-zonal level as compared to intra-zonal populations. A total of 37 reproducible amplicons were generated of which 22 were polymorphic. The number of amplicons was in the range of 6–11 and genetic distance for the studied primers ranged from 0.07 to 0.34. Fifty nine per cent polymorphism was obtained across different geographical locations. Dendrogram studied through unweighted pair group method of arithmetic analysis differentiated all the genotypes into two major clusters, Cluster I had the single population of Rajasthan and Cluster II was represented by genotypes of Delhi, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan. The Kaempferol content ranged from 0.07 to 0.49 mg/g and Delhi population was the highest accumulator.