Integrated Analysis of Genetic Diversity in Costus pictus through Phenotypic Characterization, Molecular Markers and UHPLC-MS-Based Diosgenin Profiling

Insulin plant ( Costus Pictus D. Don.), one of the priceless medicinal plants, has the ability to lower blood sugar levels. Despite the pharmaceutical industry's constant demand, this species is not being used as much at the molecular level. Therefore, the present study aimed to assess the genetic diversity among 20 accessions of C. pictus collected from various geographical regions across South India using Inter-Simple Sequence Repeat (ISSR) molecular markers and Quantification of Diosgenin using Ultra High Performance Liquid Chromatography. A total of 12 ISSR primers were used in the present study. The utilization of principal component analysis and hierarchical clustering to examine morphological diversity facilitates the selection of progenitors for breeding schemes and simplifies genotype classification. Each of the first five components accounted for roughly 74–45% of the variance. Cluster analysis was used to separate the 20 genotypes into 5 clusters, which represented the genetic diversity of the group. Principal coordinate analysis further supported this grouping, showing that the first three coordinates accounted for 43.05 percent of the total variation. Acc. genotypes. KLCP3, TNCP20, TNCP13, and IISRNAGS9101 were chosen for the insulin plant breeding program, while APCP11 and KACP8 were chosen for their high yield. Also the diosgenin genotype quantification showed impressive variability (3.365–354.05 µg/g), with the greatest content being of TNCP9 (354.05 µg/g) and then TNCP10 (148.93 µg/g). The UHPLC-MS system was very accurate (calibration curve: Y = 22576.5X + 22520.6, R² = 0.9988) diosgenin content estimation for future pharmacological applications, particularly in relation to their antidiabetic activites for genotypes are likely to be valuable sources for the development of natural drugs and by analyzing ISSR markers, we identified the genetic relationships between accessions, which can guide targeted conservation efforts.