Sami Doganlar

• PhD
• Academic at Izmir Institute of Technology

European hazelnut (Corylus avellana L.) is an important nut crop due to its nutritional benefits, culinary uses, and economic value. Türkiye is the leading producer of hazelnut, followed by Italy and the United States. Quantitative trait locus studies offer promising opportunities for breeders and geneticists to identify genomic regions controlling...

Background Faba bean (Vicia faba L.) is an important crop with high protein content. Tens of thousands of faba bean accessions are available in germplasm collections throughout the world. Morphological characterization of these materials can enrich these collections and aid in the selection of genotypes for use in breeding programs. Results In thi...

The incidence of many diseases, such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases, and diabetes, is associated with malnutrition and an unbalanced daily diet. Vegetables are an important source of vitamins and essential compounds for human health. As a result, such metabolites have increasingly become the focus of breeding programs. Tomato is one of the most...

Hazelnut (Corylus avellana L.) is an economically and socially important product for Turkey, the country that leads global production of this crop. The preservation of Turkish hazelnut genetic diversity and informed breeding of new cultivars are crucial for maintaining quality and crop yield stability. In this study, genotyping by random amplicon s...

Clavibacter michiganensis subsp. michiganensis (Cmm), is a devastating bacterial disease agent causing bacterial wilt and canker in tomatoes. There is no definitive solution to prevent yield losses by Cmm in tomatoes. Moreover, there is currently no commercially successful Cmm resistant tomato cultivar on the market. Therefore, we aimed to determin...

Cotton originated from ancestors in the Gossypium genus that grew in semi-desert habitats. As a result, it is adversely affected by low temperatures especially during germination and the first weeks of growth. Despite this, there are relatively few molecular studies on cold stress in cotton. This limitation may present a future breeding handicap, a...

The eggplant glycoalkaloids solasonine and solamargine are efficient biomacromolecules against skin diseases but are water-insoluble which results in inefficient treatment due to inadequate transdermal delivery. To address this problem, several liposomal formulations were prepared and evaluated for parameters including lecithin type, hydration temp...

Broomrape is one of the most important biotic stresses causing serious yield reductions in sunflower. Control of this parasitic plant is difficult and physical and chemical strategies are usually insufficient. Therefore, introduction of genetic resistance to broomrape in sunflower is a key breeding goal. Breeding efforts on broomrape resistance hav...

Cotton is a valuable fiber crop which supplies raw material to more than 50 industries and is produced in more than 70 countries worldwide. The superiority of cotton fiber over other crops is primarily dependent on its quality. However, further improvements in fiber length and strength are required for modern processing technology and for cotton to...

Plum is an important fruit worldwide and has high nutritional value. Prunus cerasifera Ehrh., a type of European plum species, is very popular in Turkey and is usually eaten at the green, unripe stage. In this work for the first time, the genetic diversity and population structure of the 66 accessions housed in the Turkish National P. cerasifera co...

Cotton is a valuable fiber crop which supplies raw material to more than 50 industries and is produced in more than 70 countries worldwide thus, it is worthy of its reputation as “white gold”. The superiority of cotton fiber over other crops is primarily dependent on its quality. However, further improvements in fiber length, strength and fineness...

Targeted metabolomics is a useful approach to evaluate crop breeding studies. Antioxidant and flavor-related traits are of increasing interest and are considered quality traits in tomato breeding. The present study presents chromatographic methods to study antioxidants (carotenoids, vitamin C, vitamin E, phenolic compounds, and glutathione) and fla...

Most consumers complain about the flavor of current tomato cultivars and many pay a premium for alternatives such as heirloom varieties. Breeding for fruit flavor is difficult because it is a quantitatively inherited trait influenced by taste, aroma and environmental factors. A lack of genetic diversity in modern tomato cultivars also necessitates...

Selenium (Se) is present in a wide variety of natural and man-made materials on Earth. Plants are able to tolerate and (hyper)accumulate Se to different extents. In fact, some species can tolerate and accumulate multiple elements. Puccinellia distans (P. distans), weeping alkali grass, is known to hyperaccumulate extreme concentrations of boron and...

The nutritional value of a crop lies not only in its protein, lipid, and sugar content but also involves compounds such as the antioxidants lycopene, β-carotene and vitamin C. In the present study, wild tomato Solanum pimpinellifolium LA 1589 was assessed for its potential to improve antioxidant content. This wild species was found to be a good sou...

Turkey is a rich source of European hazelnut (Corylus avellana) germplasm with nearly 400 accessions in the national collection. This genetic material encompasses cultivars, landraces and wild genotypes which were characterized for 12 nut and 13 kernel traits over 2 years in the 1990s. Analysis of these attributes revealed both the positive and neg...

More than half of European hazelnut (Corylus avellana) production occurs in Turkey. Despite this dominance, the yield of Turkish cultivars has remained stagnant over the past 10 years with Italian yield nearly double that in Turkey. This difference is due to Turkey’s unique cultivation system; hazelnuts are grown in bushy clusters (“ocak” system),...

European hazelnut (Corylus avellana) is a diploid tree species and is widely used in confections. Hazelnuts are, to a large part, produced in Turkey with the cultivar “Tombul” widely grown in the Black Sea region. In this work, the “Tombul” genome was partially sequenced by next-generation sequencing technology yielding 29.2% (111.85 Mb) of the ~ 3...

Cotton is an economically important commodity for nearly fifty industries including the textile sector which is largely based on cotton fiber. Identification of markers linked to loci for fiber traits under drought stress may be particularly beneficial because such loci could provide the genetic adaptability needed to produce good fiber under water...

Eggplant is a vegetable crop that is grown around the world and can provide significant nutritive benefits thanks to its abundance of vitamins, phenolics and antioxidants. In addition, eggplant has potential pharmaceutical uses that are just now becoming recognized. As compared to other crops in the Solanaceae, few studies have investigated eggplan...

Drought causes serious yield losses in cotton production throughout the world. Association mapping allows identification and localization of the genes controlling drought-related traits which will be helpful in cotton breeding. In the present study, genetic diversity analysis and association mapping of yield and drought traits were performed on a p...

Stanleya pinnata is a perennial herb that can hyperaccumulate selenium. In the present study, genetic diversity of 15 accessions of S. pinnata originating from different locations in the USA was determined using sequence amplified polymorphism (SRAP) markers. A total of 506 alleles were identified among the 15 accessions and 98% of these alleles we...

Olive (Olea europaea L.) is one of the most important crops in the Mediterranean region including Palestine and Turkey. In this study, the genetic diversity and population structure of 19 olive cultivars (15 from Palestine and 4 from Turkey) was assessed using simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers. The 14 SSR markers yielded 110 alleles with 91% pol...

The aim of this study was to compare the performance of a DNA-barcode assay with fatty acid profile analysis to authenticate the botanical origin of olive oil. To achieve this aim, we performed a PCR-capillary electrophoresis (PCR-CE) approach on olive oil: seed oil blends using the plastid trnL (UAA) intron barcode. In parallel to genomic analysis...

Faba bean (Vivia faba L.) is an important legume species because of its high protein and starch content. Broad bean can be grown in different climatic conditions and is an ideal rotation crop because of the nitrogen fixing bacteria in its roots. In this work, 255 faba bean germplasm accessions were characterized using 32 SSR primers which yielded 3...

Tomato leaf miner (Tuta absoluta) is a major pest of tomato in regions with hot climates such as South America and the Mediterranean. This insect feeds on almost every part of the plant and forms galleries while feeding on the plant’s inner tissues. Thus, it can cause plant death and is costly and difficult to control with chemical sprays. In this...

European hazelnut (Corylus avellana L.) is an economically and nutritionally important nut crop with wild and cultivated populations found throughout Europe and in parts of Asia. This study examined the molecular genetic diversity and population structure of 402 genotypes including 143 wild individuals, 239 landraces, and 20 cultivars from the Turk...

Spinach is a popular leafy green vegetable due to its nutritional composition. It contains high concentrations of vitamins A, E, C, and K, and folic acid. Development of genetic markers for spinach is important for diversity and breeding studies. In this work, Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) technology was used to develop genomic simple sequence r...

Gene diversity (GD), also called polymorphism information content, is a commonly used measure of molecular marker polymorphism. Calculation of GD for dominant markers such as AFLP, RAPD, and multilocus SSRs is valuable for researchers. To meet this need, we developed a free online computer program, GDdom, which provides easy, quick, and accurate ca...

Boron is an essential plant micronutrient; but is toxic at high concentrations. Boron toxicity can severely affect crop productivity in arid and semi-arid environments. Puccinellia distans (Jacq.) Par1. , common alkali grass, is found throughout the world and can survive under boron concentrations that are lethal for other plant species. In additio...

Faba bean (Vicia faba L.) is an important food legume crop with a huge genome. Development of genetic markers for faba bean is important to study diversity and for molecular breeding. In this study, we used Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) technology for the development of genomic simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers. A total of 14,027,500 sequence...

European hazelnut (Corylus avellana L.), cultivated in several areas of the world including Europe, Anatolia, and the USA, is an economically important nut crop due to its high mineral, oleic acid, amino acid, and phenolic compound content and pleasant flavor. This study examined molecular genetic diversity and population structure of 54 wild acces...

Cotton is an important crop in the textile, food and pharmaceutical industries. In the present study, a panel of 108 elite cotton (Gossypium hirsutum L.) lines was genotyped with 177 genome-wide SSR markers to assess genetic diversity, linkage disequilibrium, population structure and association analyses. A total of 967 loci were assayed and the li...

Background: Solanum pimpinellifolium has high breeding potential for fruit quality traits and has been used as a donor in tomato breeding programs. Unlocking the genetic potential of S. pimpinellifolium requires high-throughput polymorphism identification protocols for QTL mapping and introgression of favourable alleles into cultivated tomato by bo...

Sesame (Sesamum indicum L. syn. Sesamum orientale L.) is considered to be the first oil seed crop known to man. Despite its versatile use as an oil seed and a leafy vegetable, sesame is a neglected crop and has not been a subject of molecular genetic research until the last decade. There is thus limited knowledge regarding genome-specific molecular...

The Solanaceae was among the first plant families to be analyzed via comparative mapping and thus was a pioneer in the realm of synteny studies. Analyses of chromosome content and organization have employed a range of techniques, including linkage mapping of genes and molecular markers, physical mapping via fluorescence in situ hybridization, and s...

Natural root-knot nematode resistance genes are unique resources to control this major pest in pepper (Capsicum annuum). Although four genes (Me1, Me3, Me7 and N) conferring broad-spectrum resistance were mapped to a cluster in a 28-cm interval on chromosome P9, limited markers targeting this region were available. In the present study, the Me-gene...

Gene diversity (GD), also called polymorphism information content, is a commonly used measure of molecular marker polymorphism. Calculation of GD for dominant markers such as AFLP, RAPD, and multilocus SSRs is valuable for researchers. To meet this need, we developed a free online computer program, GDdom, which provides easy, quick, and accurate ca...

Natural root-knot nematode resistance genes are unique resources to control this major pest in pepper (Capsicum annuum). Although four genes (Me1, Me3, Me7 and N) conferring broad-spectrum resistance were mapped to a cluster in a 28-cm interval on chromosome P9, limited markers targeting this region were available. In the present study, the Me-gene...

Recently developed plant genomics approaches (LD mapping and genome-wide selection) require many molecular markers distributed throughout the plant genome. As a result, the availability of an increasing number of markers is essential for maintaining highly efficient and accurate plant breeding programs. In this study, we identified SNP loci in sunf...

Faba bean (Vicia faba L.) is an important food and feed legume because of the nutritional value of its seed protein and starch content, good biomass, and high efficiency nitrogen fixation.This study analyzed the molecular genetic diversity and population structure of 101 Turkish faba bean accessions using simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers.A tota...

As the sole plant source of many potent alkaloids, opium poppy (Papaver somniferum L.) is an important medicinal crop. Nevertheless, few studies have characterized opium poppy germplasm with crop-specific molecular markers. Because Turkey is a diversity center for opium poppy, Turkish germplasm is a valuable genetic resource for association mapping...

Glycoalkaloids are plant secondary metabolites that can be both harmful and beneficial to human health. They cause gastroenteric symptoms, coma and even death at high concentrations. It is thought that glycoalkaloids are toxic to human health as a result of their effects on the nervous system and destruction of cell membranes. On the other hand, gl...

Reconstructing a tree of life by inferring evolutionary history is an important focus of evolutionary biology. Phylogenetic reconstructions also provide useful information for a range of scientific disciplines such as botany, zoology, phylogeography, archaeology and biological anthropology. Until the development of protein and DNA sequencing techni...

Sesame (Sesamum indicum L. syn. Sesamum orientale L.) is an orphan crop species with most molecular genetic research work done in the last decade. In this study, we used a pyrosequenc-ing approach for the development of genomic simple-sequence repeat (SSR) markers in sesame. Our approach proved successful in identifying 19,816 nonredundant SSRs, 57...

Root knot nematodes (Meloidogyne spp.) are significant agricultural pests on many crops, including pepper (Capsicum annuum). Host plant resistance offers the most sustainable means of controlling this pest. A cluster of genes on chromosome 9 confers resistance, with Me1 providing protection against three nematode species: M. incognita, M. javanica...

The aim of this study was to develop a DNA-barcode assay to authenticate the botanical origin of herbal teas. To reach this aim, we tested the efficiency of a PCR-Capillary Electrophoresis (PCR-CE) approach on commercial herbal tea samples using two non-coding plastid barcodes, the trnL intron and the intergenic spacer between trnL and trnF. Barcod...

The conservation of plant germplasm is essential to ensure future breeding gains and crop bio-diversity. To be truly useful, such germplasm must be characterized for morphological traits and genetic diversity. In this work, agro-morphological diversity was assessed in 137 Turkish sesame (Sesamum indicum L.) genotypes (129 accessions and eight culti...

The aim of this study was to establish a DNA-based identification key to ascertain the cultivar origin of Turkish monovarietal olive oils. To reach this aim, we sequenced short fragments from five olive genes for SNP (Single Nucleotide Polymorphism) identification and developed CAPS (Cleaved Amplified Polymorphic DNA) assays for SNPs that alter res...

Wild tomato species have been widely used for improvement of tomato disease resistance but have not been extensively explored for health-related traits. In this work, three interspecific populations derived from backcrosses between cultivated tomato and Solanum pimpinellifolium (LA1589), S. habrochaites (LA1223), and S. peruvianum (LA2172) were ana...

Fifty-eight F2 individuals derived from an interspecific cross between cultivated eggplant, Solanum melongena, and its wild relative, S. linnaeanum, were phenotyped for 42 plant, leaf, flower, and fruit traits. Composite interval mapping analysis using genotypic data from 736 molecular markers revealed the positions of 71 statistically significant...

Opium poppy (Papaver somniferum L.) is an important pharmaceutical crop with very few genetic marker resources. To expand these resources, we sequenced genomic DNA using pyrosequencing technology and examined the DNA sequences for simple sequence repeats (SSRs). A total of 1,244,412 sequence reads were obtained covering 474 Mb. Approximately half o...

Pepper (Capsicum annuum L.) is one of the most important vegetables cultivated worldwide. Many pests and pathogens cause economic yield losses in pepper. Potato virus Y (PVY), Tomato spotted wilt virus(TSWV) and Pepper mild mottle virus (PMMoV) are considered among the most destructive viruses affecting pepper in the world. Because chemical treatme...

Pepper (Capsicum annuum L.) is one of the most important vegetables cultivated worldwide. Many pests and pathogens cause economic yield losses in pepper. Potato virus Y (PVY), Tomato spotted wilt virus(TSWV) and Pepper mild mottle virus (PMMoV) are considered among the most destructive viruses affecting pepper in the world. Because chemical treatme...

With almost 870 million people estimated to suffer fromchronic hunger worldwide, undernourishment represents amajor problem that severely affects people in developing countries. In addition to undernourishment, micronutrient deficiency alone can be a cause of serious illness and death. Large portions of the world population rely on a single, starch...

All publicly available opium poppy expressed sequence tag (EST) sequences, totalling 20 885, were assembled into unigenes and examined for simple sequence repeats (SSRs). Nearly 19% of the 14 957 unigenes contained SSRs with 4% harbouring more than one SSR. Average den-sity of the SSRs was 1 SSR per 3.6 kb of non-redundant EST sequence. Trinucleoti...

Turkey is a secondary center of diversity for melon (Cucumis melo) and is home to a variety of regional morphotypes. This diversity is housed in a national germplasm repository with more than 500 accessions. Molecular genetic variability of 209 melon genotypes from 115 accessions of this collection was characterized using amplified fragment length...

The antioxidant potential of 42 melon (Cucumis melo) lines including six cultivars grown in Turkey was assessed by measuring total water-soluble antioxidant capacity, phenolic and vitamin C contents. The lines showed significant variability for all three antioxidant parameters with breeding lines having higher antioxidant capacity and phenolic cont...

The genetic diversity and relatedness of 90 watermelon (Citrullus lanatus var. lanthus and Citrullus. lanatus var. citroides) accessions were molecularly characterized using 30 sequence-related amplified polymorphism (SRAP) marker combinations. The accessions were collected from Turkey (59 accessions) and other regions of the world by the United St...

The growth and ion content of salt sensitive Lycopersicon esculentum Mill. cv. M82 and salt tolerant L. pennellii Correll accession LA716 were examined under both control and stress conditions (150 mM NaCl). L. esculentum grew more vigorously than L. pennellii under optimal conditions, however, L. pennellii was able to maintain its growth better th...

In Turkey, local varieties of eggplant (Solanum melongena L.) occur in several types (including round, semi-long and long) and are a staple ingredient of the cuisine. Although Turkish eggplant varieties are morphologically distinct, little is known about their molecular genetic variation. In this study, the genetic variability of 67 Turkish eggplan...

Within the genus Solanum, the term 'eggplant' encompasses several cultivated species that are used for food and, to a lesser extent, for medicine. The use of one common name to describe more than one species and the existence of many related wild species have led to taxonomic confusion which, in turn, have complicated analyses of evolutionary relat...

Tomato is one of the most widely produced and consumed vegetable crops worldwide. Plant breeders have usually focused on improvement of horticulturally important traits such as yield, fruit size, shape and colour. With increased attention on human health, however, plant breeders also consider the improvement of health-related traits of fruits and v...

Olive (Olea europaea L.) is one of the most important and characteristic fruit crops of the Mediterranean region. This crop has been grown in Turkey for more than 3000 yr and many varieties are currently grown in five geographic regions. In this study, the genetic diversity of 66 olive varieties from these regions was assessed using simple sequence...

Growth characteristics and antioxidant content of M82, LA716 and IL lines under control conditions and salt stress. For M82 and LA716, salt effect refers to the fold change in trait/activity observed when lines were subject to salt stress as compared to control conditions. Salt effect values are only included for those differences which were statis...

Loci identified for the antioxidant traits in the IL population. Control and salt-specific QTL names are suffixed with "c" and "s" respectively. Effect refers to the phenotypic effect (percent change relative to M82) of the S. pennellii allele for each locus.

Excessive soil salinity is an important problem for agriculture, however, salt tolerance is a complex trait that is not easily bred into plants. Exposure of cultivated tomato to salt stress has been reported to result in increased antioxidant content and activity. Salt tolerance of the related wild species, Solanum pennellii, has also been associat...

In this study, total water soluble antioxidant activity and phenolic content of 26 eggplant (Solanum melongena L.) cultivars were investigated. Total water soluble antioxidant activity of the cultivars varied from 2664 to 8247 μmolTrolox/kg, which is a 3.1-fold difference. Cultivars also showed significant variation for total phenolic contents rang...

Potato Y potyvirus (PVY) is an important plant pathogen worldwide that infects and causes yield losses in the family Solanaceae including potato (Solarium tuberosum), pepper (Capsicum spp.), tomato (S. lycopersicum), and tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum). In this study, 20 different tomato accessions representing 6 different species were mechanically ino...

In this work, 29 pepper cultivars that represent the diversity of types and varieties grown in Turkey were analyzed for water-soluble antioxidant capacity and phenolic and vitamin C contents. In addition, 14 non-Turkish cultivars were tested for comparison. Significant diversity was observed in the different cultivars with the most variation (7.4-f...

A practical set of HPLC methods was developed for the separation and determination of the eggplant steroidal glycoalkaloids, solanine, chaconine, solasonine, solamargine, and their aglycones, solasodine and solanidine. A gradient method was initially developed, but proved to be neither robust nor practical. Three separate isocratic methods using ac...

Eggplant fruit color is highly variable, both for qualitative as well as quantitative aspects. Pigment chemistry explains part of the many nuances which are discernible by eye between green fruited cultivars, and even more between the so called "violet-purple" fruited cultivars. Phenotypic complexity of eggplant fruit colour (at commercial stage) c...

Despite their unsuitability for agricultural production, the wild relatives of crop species represent a largely untapped resource of novel QTLs potentially useful for crop plant improvement. In this regard, previous introgression studies, involving several different wild tomato species, have shown that the long arm of chromosome 4 contains QTLs for...

An interspecific F(2) population from a cross between cultivated eggplant, Solanum melongena, and its wild relative, S. linnaeanum, was analyzed for quantitative trait loci (QTL) affecting leaf, flower, fruit and plant traits. A total of 58 plants were genotyped for 207 restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) markers and phenotyped for 18 c...

The near-isogenic line (NIL) TA1150 contains a 56-cM introgression from Lycopersicon chmielewskii chromosome 1 and has several interesting phenotypic characteristics including fruit with orange color, high levels of soluble solids, thick pericarp, small stem scars, and good firmness. A set of overlapping recombinant lines (subNILs) was developed an...