LAUSR

1Universidade do Estado de Mato Grosso (UNEMAT), Faculdade de Ciências Biológicas e Agrárias, Alta Floresta, MT, Brasil 2Universidade do Estado de Mato Grosso, Ciências Biológicas, Alta Floresta, MT, Brasil Abstract In view of the economic and environmental importance of Bertholletia excelsa Bonpl. for the Amazon and the reducing natural habitat area of this species, the present study proposes to examine genetic variability among accessions of Brazil nut from the Amazon rainforest. Seventeen native Brazil nut genotypes were sampled from Sinop-MT and the genomic DNA were amplified using 15 inter-simple sequence repeat (ISSR) markers. The percent polymorphism and the polymorphism information content (PIC) of each primer were determined. The primers amplified 84.62% of the polymorphic bands and 15.38% of the monomorphic bands. The PIC for each primer ranged from 0 to 0.68. The Unweighted Pair Group Method with Arithmetic Mean (UPGMA) was the most efficient in group representation, as it showed the highest cophenetic correlation coefficient (CCC = 0.92), the lowest stress (12.31%) and the lowest distortion (1.51%). The use of ISSR markers was an efficient tool in the study of genetic diversity among Brazil nut genotypes, and the genetic diversity found can be used for conservation and pre-breeding programs for this crop.