Amplified fragment length polymorphism

Amplified fragment length polymorphism (AFLP-PCR or AFLP) is a

Although AFLP should not be used as an acronym, it is commonly referred to as "Amplified fragment length polymorphism". However, the resulting data are not scored as length polymorphisms, but instead as presence-absence polymorphisms.[2]

AFLP-PCR is a highly sensitive method for detecting polymorphisms in DNA. The technique was originally described by Vos and Zabeau in 1993.^[3][2] In detail, the procedure of this technique is divided into three steps:

1. Digestion of total cellular DNA with one or more restriction enzymes and ligation of restriction half-site specific adaptors to all restriction fragments.
2. Selective amplification of some of these fragments with two PCR primers that have corresponding adaptor and restriction site specific sequences.
3. Electrophoretic separation of amplicons on a gel matrix, followed by visualisation of the band pattern.

Applications

The AFLP technology has the capability to detect various polymorphisms in different genomic regions simultaneously. It is also highly sensitive and reproducible. As a result, AFLP has become widely used for the identification of genetic variation in strains or closely related species of plants, fungi, animals, and bacteria. The AFLP technology has been used in criminal and paternity tests, also to determine slight differences within populations, and in linkage studies to generate maps for quantitative trait locus (QTL) analysis.

There are many advantages to AFLP when compared to other marker technologies including randomly amplified polymorphic DNA (