Taxonomic Significance of ISTR to Discriminate Species in Agavaceae

Family Agavaceae is endemic of American Continent. From the around 300 species recognized in this family, 217 occur in Mexico. Relevant ethnobotanic relationships among Agavaceae and the several native human cultures of the American Continent have been established since prehispanic times. Agave is one of the most important genus in that family due to its great diversity and abundance, mainly in arid and semiarid regions of Mexico. In this country, near to 15 species of Agave are used to elaborate alcoholic beverages. Agave tequilana weber var. azul is indubitable the most important of them because is the raw material to elaborate a particular worldly famous class of mescal, named tequila. Agave salmiana, A. maximiliana and A. durangensis are species less famous than A. tequilana, but they also have a high quality and level of carbohydrates and in fact, support local mescal industries. In these last species several taxonomic controversies exist concerning their specific delimitation. In this study the molecular characterization of eight species of Agavaceae using ISTR was performed in order to determine the significance of these markers for discriminating among specific taxa. The results suggest that these molecular markers are worthy to typify species of Agavaceae and detect intrapopulation variability.