Whole Transcriptome Sequencing Unveils the Genomic Determinants of Putative Somaclonal Variation in Mint (Mentha L.)

Mint (Mentha L., Lamiaceae) is a strongly scented herb of the family Lamiaceae that is grown mostly by clonal propagation, making it a valuable species for the study of somaclonal variation and its phenotypic consequences. The recent introduction of a few species of mint in South America, followed by a presumably rampant propagation, make this region particularly ideal for studying the extent of somaclonal genetic diversity. Hence, the objective of this work was to offer a preliminary characterization of somaclonal genetically coding diversity of the mint in the northern Andes in order to address the question of whether somaclonal variants may have emerged despite relatively recent introductions in a region where mint is not native. A total of 29 clonally propagated specimens, collected in mint export farms in the province of Antioquia, a major region for mint production in the northwest Andes of Colombia, were genotyped using RNA sequencing (RNA-Seq). SNP calling was carried out from the leaves’ transcriptome profiles of each plant by combining the GATK4 and TRINITY protocols, obtaining a total of 2033 loci across 912 transcripts with a minimum read depth of 20X and 4% of missing data. Unsupervised machine learning algorithms considered the K-means, AGNES and UPGMA approaches, all of which suggested three genetic clusters for M. spicata and a unique cluster for M. × piperita. The results indicate that at least two different origins of M. spicata reached the eastern region of the Antioquia province, clonally propagated in the locality ever since for local consumption and export. One of these ancestries had more population structure, possibly due to environmental or anthropological pressures that intervened in the fragmentation of this genetic group or to a higher somaclonal mutation rate. This work offers a first step into the study of the accumulation and transmission of presumably quasi-neutral somatic mutations at coding regions in an herbaceous clonally propagated scented species such as mint, likely favored by an expected population expansion after its Andean introduction. These ad hoc hypotheses warrant further study as part of future research.