Hordein Variation in Wild (Hordeum Spontaneum) and Cultivated (H. Vulgare) Barley

The storage protein hordein contains two major groups of polypeptides which are highly polymorphic in barley, and in its evolutionary progenitor Hordeum spontaneum Koch. Crosses between the two species showed that the complex electrophoretic phenotypes within the two groups of polypeptides are governed by codominant alleles at two corresponding loci, Hor-1 and Hor-2, which are moderately linked (11% ± 2).

In natural populations of the wild species, the two complex hordein loci were much more polymorphic than the allozyme loci. Furthermore, the variation at these two loci was highly correlated so that individuals differ from one another at both loci much more frequently than expected from the allele frequencies at the individual loci.

Considerable hordein variation was also present in Composite Cross XXI, and there was evidence of reassortment of patterns by the seventeenth generation. Thus the complex hordein loci, with their extreme diversity and linkage disequilibrium, are ideal markers for monitoring evolutionary processes in both natural, or composite cross populations.