Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) are
the most abundant DNA markers in plant genomes. In this
study, based on 54,465 SNPs between the genomes of two
Indica varieties, Minghui 63 (MH63) and Zhenshan 97
(ZS97) and additional 20,705 SNPs between the MH63 and
Nipponbare genomes, we identified and confirmed 1,633
well-distributed SNPs by PCR and Sanger sequencing.
From these, a set of 372 SNPs were further selected to
analyze the patterns of genetic diversity in 300 representative
rice inbred lines from 22 rice growing countries
worldwide. Using this set of SNPs, we were able to
uncover the well-known Indica–Japonica subspecific differentiation
and geographic differentiations within Indica
and Japonica. Furthermore, our SNP results revealed some
common and contrasting patterns of the haplotype diversity
along different rice chromosomes in the Indica and
Japonica accessions, which suggest different evolutionary
forces possibly acting in specific regions of the rice genome
during domestication and evolution of rice. Our results
demonstrated that this set of SNPs can be used as anchor
SNPs for large scale genotyping in rice molecular breeding
research involving Indica–Japonica and Indica–Indica
crosses.