The 2,300 apples and 250 pears in the National Fruit Collection are to be genetically fingerprinted after scientists at East Malling Research were handed a three year Defra contract.
The researchers will use DNA markers called microsatellites to produce individual profiles for each tree. This will aid curators in verifying the uniqueness of material in these collections, as well as helping in the identification of trees previously unnamed after traditional morphological comparisons.
EMR has already fingerprinted the first half of the 545 pears and 200 cherries in the National Fruit Collection.
As the collection is being verified using a set of reference microsatellite markers approved in collaboration with other international groups, the collection will become directly comparable with those of other countries.
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