Key personnel: Ms. Chandrani Abayagunawardane

Evaluating genetic resousrces of enedemic wild rice specis Oryza rhyzomatis Vaughan for defeating water scarity in rice cultivation

In addition to the cultivated rice, Oryza sativa, Sri Lanka is the home to five wild rice species that belong to three species complexes of the genus Oryza. They are O. rhizomatis (CC genome), endemic to Sri Lanka, O. nivara (AA genome), O. rufiphogon (AA genome), O. eichingeri (CC genome), and O. granulata (GG genome). While some species are easily recognizable, in some literature O. rhizomatis is considered a synonym for O. eichengeri. It is further complicated by possible inter-species hybridization (Ray et al. 2018) and intra-species diversity. Nevertheless, correct identification is the essential first step in sustainable utilization and conservation efforts. Therefore, theresearch focused on the morphological and molecular characterization of wild and cultivated rice species in Sri Lanka. The morphological traits included plant characteristics, floral characteristics, and Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) analysis of pollen. The complete chloroplast genomes of O. rhizomatis, O. eichingeri and O. granulata from Sri Lanka were assembled from a 20x coverage Illumina HiSeq data. In addition to universal barcoding regions, publically available data from the same species and other species were included in the phylogenetic analysis. Further, we assessed the intra-species diversity of O. rhizomatis with an islandwide collection.