Molecular genetic diversity and population structure of Iranian honey bee (Apis mellifera meda) populations: implications for breeding and conservation.

The honey bee (Apis mellifera), as one of the most important pollinating insects, plays a critical role in biodiversity conservation and global food security. Genetic diversity monitoring is an important step to maintain diversity in animal populations, including honey bees. The current research aimed to evaluate the population genetic structure and molecular genetic diversity among 300 honey bee workers from 20 different populations in Iran using 10 ISSR primers. A total of 85 bands were detected using 10 primers of which 38 (44.7%) were polymorphic. The results showed that the evaluated Iranian honey bee (Apis mellifera meda) populations were characterized by low genetic diversity in terms of the number of alleles per locus, considering gene diversity and Shannon information index. Overall, gene diversity in the studied populations was low, and the average for each primer was observed 0.184 ± 0.211. Significant deviations from Hardy Weinberg Equilibrium (HWE) due to heterozygous deficiency were detected in most populations. Low FST values indicate the low genetic structure within and among Iranian honey bee populations. Cluster analysis showed that honey bee samples were classified into two groups. Our findings showed that the genetic diversity of Iranian honey bees has been declining and causing the population to become more homozygous. Results of the present study provide reference information set for future endemic honey bee biodiversity protection and other controlled breeding programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]