Cross-Species Transferability of SSR Markers for Analyzing Genetic Diversity of Different <i>Vicia</i> species Collections

Legumes play an essential role in sustainable agriculture due to their ability to fix nitrogen and high protein content. <i>Vicia</i> is a relevant genus of the <i>Fabaceae</i> family that includes important crop species, such as <i>V. faba</i> and <i>V. sativa</i>, but also other species considered minor crops. They are mainly used as animal feed and usually cope resiliently with extreme conditions; therefore, they could play an essential role in sustainable agriculture under the present scenario of climate change and growing population. However, the scarcity of commercial cultivars limits their use. The Spanish National Plant Genetic Resources Center has collections of several species of the genus <i>Vicia</i>, including international landraces, which could be an essential source of biodiversity for breeding programs. These seed resources are underutilized due to the limited availability of characterization data, including the lack of molecular markers for these species. In this study, we analyzed the cross-transferability of SSR (simple sequence repeat) molecular markers from <i>V. sativa</i> and <i>V. ervilia</i> to distinct species of the genus <i>Vicia</i>. We also used heterologous validated markers for the genotypic characterization and genetic diversity analysis of almost 500 accessions of three undercharacterized <i>Vicia</i> collections: <i>V. articulata</i> (one-flower vetch), <i>V. ervilia</i> (bitter vetch), and <i>V. narbonensis</i> (narbon bean or French vetch). Subsequently, these molecular data were integrated with passport and agromorphological data to select representative varieties from these <i>Vicia</i> collections and establish core collections, with minimum loss of genetic diversity <i>versus</i> the Spanish total collections. The characterization of these legume collections is an essential step from an economic and ecological point of view to obtain selected <i>Vicia</i> varieties to be used in sustainable agriculture.