Morphological characters have traditionally been used as signatures of varietal
identity and purity. Because provide an indirect means of assessing genetic composition, those
characters provide a poor base for measures of genetic identities. However, molecular characters
that more quickly and accurately reveal genetic differences without the obscurance of environment
provide significant advantages in discrimination, reliability, timeliness and reduced cost. A relatively
new molecular method, Random Amplified Polymorphic DNA (RAPD), that are based on
Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR), whose simplicity, low cost, accessibility and no require of
previous information about nucleotide sequence of genome from the species have encouraged the
application by researchers involved in the development of methods for cultivar identification.
Unfortunately, the RAPD analysis presents serious problems on reproducibility and homology
knowledge of products. If these problems can be effectively overcome then RAPD analysis may
become an effective and applicable method, but perhaps the investment in time and money be
more useful on the development and adaptation of more promissory techniques. There is
considerable work in the literature on this method. All suffer from say the same problem. The
inherent variability of the product from amplifications whit decamer primers limits its utility to
industry and certification programs. The objective of this work was discuss about the RAPD
analysis efficiency on cultivar identification, showing the vantages and limitations of the technique.