Detection of somaclonal variation in cultured rice cells using digoxigenin-based random amplified polymorphic DNA

A procedure for the non-radioactive detection of random amplified polymorphic DNA (RAPD) was developed and designated as digoxigenin (DIG)-based RAPD. Using this procedure, we analyzed somaclonal variation in cultured cells of rice. Somaclonal variation was found to increase with culture age. More than 50 polymorphic fragments were identified with the four primers tested. Random sequencing of 10 clones generated one intron, one 5'-noncoding, and eight non-redundant expressed sequences. A database search for homology showed that the eight exon sequences displayed a significant similarity to sequences already stored in EMBL, GenBank and DDBJ. The sources of the known genes ranged From microorganism to human, including three rice genes. The results showed that somaclonal variation might have occurred in transfer RNA, ribosomal protein, and other genes during cell culture.