Genome-wide assessment of Population Structure and Genetic Diversity for Anabasis aphylla

Anabasis aphylla is a chenopodiaceous shrub. It has important ecological, economic and medicinal values . Furthermore, A. aphylla has a certain distribution in China, Iran (Khatibi et al., 2017), Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. In China, it is mainly distributed in Xinjiang. However, due to the influence of agricultural development, oil exploitation, harsh environmental conditions and other activities, the habitat of A. aphylla populations in Xinjiang was severely fragmented. All of this caused the self-renewal ability of A. aphylla population was poor, and most of the areas were in a recession trend. In view of the unique habitat of desert plants, the response to climate change is different from other plants. Therefore, use SNP molecular marker technology to analyze the genetic diversity of A. aphylla distributed in different areas of Xinjiang, which has a certain regional characteristic. Our study also provides a valuable resource for further genome-wide association studies in A. aphylla and has a special ecological significance for maintaining fragile ecosystems in the arid regions of northwest China.