Genetic analyses of the resistance of faba beans (Vicia faba) to the fungus Ascochyta fabae
Genetic analyses of the resistance of faba beans (Vicia faba) to the fungus Ascochyta fabae
von Rabia Faridi
Datum der mündl. Prüfung:2022-03-25
Erschienen:2022-07-26
Betreuer:Dr. Wolfgang Link
Gutachter:Dr. Birger Koopmann
Gutachter:Dr. Antje Schierholt
Gutachter:Prof. Dr. Gunter Backes
Dateien
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Zusammenfassung
Englisch
Climate warming is a huge challenge for agronomists, although it may offer opportunities to new crops and new types of old crops, such as winter types in so far spring-sown species. In Germany, mostly spring faba beans (Vicia faba L.) are grown. The currently improved winter hardiness of winter faba beans catches up with the upcoming milder German winters. Such autumn-sown beans are a novelty for farmers. The improvement of winter faba beans’ genetic defence against important biotic stresses such as Ascochyta blight will allow their inclusion into German crop rotations. Ascochyta blight is caused by the fungus Ascochyta fabae; severe yield losses were re-ported in susceptible cultivars of faba beans. Traditionally, the disease is controlled by avoiding sowing Ascochyta infected seed. The genetic improvement of Ascochyta blight resistance through conventional breeding is demanding and laborious, because of complex inheritance, low heritability (h2) and frequent calamities with uneven infection levels in the field situation. Several sources of Ascochyta resistance have already been described. However, the genes for resistance and their mode of action are still not identified. A resistance gene pyramiding approach would be helpful but relies on the identification of markers tightly linked to the resistance genes (or, better, on the identification of the causal alleles). Such QTL identification heavily depends upon the accuracy of phenotypic data. With this situation as background, we performed a detailed screening and phenotyping of 224 highly homozygous lines of faba beans, including the A-set lines of the Göttingen Winter Bean Population (GWBP, 188 inbred lines; cf. Ali et al., 2016) under controlled conditions for Ascochyta resistance. Two strains of Ascochyta fabae were spray-inoculated as mixture on potted juvenile plants in greenhouse; plants were visually scored eight times in a 30 day period on leaflets and on stem, for number and size (cm) of lesions, area (%) covered by lesions and for presence of Ascochyta pycnidia at leaflet and stem. The experimental unit was one plant. The accumulated (across the eight dates) and averaged (across 12 replicates) scores per trait, were used as phenotypic data. To judge the validity of the method and to employ estimates of h² for planning, predictions (prospective heritability values) from the first two replicates and post-experiments predictions (retrospective heritability values) from all 12 replicates were generated. Based on the prospective predictions, 12 replicates were required to achieve a value of heritability higher than h²=70%, which was deemed as sufficient (the finally realized value was h²=87%). Substantial and significant genetic variation for Ascochyta-resistance traits was detected, and all eight assessed traits were seemingly genetically correlated. The strongest correlation, r= 0.93** was between no. of lesions per leaflet and area covered by the lesions per leaflet. A total of five lines (S_162-1-1-2-2, S_009-1-1-4, S_038-1-1-1-1-3-8, (Hiv/2-5 x 29H-2)-15413 and (Hiv/2-5 x 29H-2)-1-15413)) out of 224 lines performed better than the resistant line 29H. The three most susceptible lines were Manafest-2, S_232-1-1-1-16-6 and S_060-1-7. The A-set with its 188 inbred lines was utilized for our ‘guided’ genome-wide association study. The GWAS was the first genome-wide association study with a focus on Ascochyta blight in Vicia faba. The analyses were thus based on 188 faba bean inbred lines, two strains of Ascochyta fabae, and a total of 2058 DNA markers (1829 AFLP-marker and 229 SNP-marker, including 17 so-called ‘guide’ SNP-markers). The average LD among all the markers was very low (r2 = 0.0075); the number of markers probably did not match such high genetic resolution. To alleviate these limita-tions and to steer the focus towards Ascochyta blight resistance genes, the so-called guided marker approach was conducted in addition to the default genome-wide analyses. The 17 guide SNP markers were defined by alignments of locus positions of the previously published maps with our available map. In this way, nine of the markers were identified as potentially being linked to a published Ascochyta QTL. Further eight guide markers were not directly picked from a published map because the distance between the published QTL and the common markers was high. Therefore, linear regression of cM data was applied with the positions of sets of common markers, to roughly predict the positions of two of the published QTL markers in our available map. Our association study is thus a study in two layers: a genome-wide association study with all randomly chosen markers, and, included, a guided approach based on the 17 guide SNP markers. A total of 12 markers, including nine AFLP and three SNP markers displayed significant associations with six traits (number of lesions per leaflet, area covered by lesions per leaflet, presence of pycnidia per leaflet, length of the biggest lesion per leaflet, length of biggest lesion at stem, presence of pycnidia at stem; nine of these markers probably stand for new resistance genes. Significant DNA markers were found at chromosomes I, III, IV, V, and VI in the descendants of the Göttingen Winter Bean Population. The guided approach was successful: one of our 17 guide marker (Vf-Mt1g014230-001) was found significant and it is hypothesized that this SNP at chromosome III validates the previously reported QTL (Af1; chromosome III). The guided marker approach for genome-wide analyses proved to be successful in a species, where no genome sequence was available. Applied marker-assisted selection for Ascochyta resistance relies strongly on the transfer of genetic results among different faba bean populations, depending on further marker-saturation of QTL bearing chromosomal regions. The new putative resistance loci in the Göttingen Winter Bean Population recommend this germplasm as a possible source for resistance breeding.
Keywords: Ascochyta blight, Ascochta fabae; faba bean (Vicia faba L.) Fava bean; Genome wide association study (GWAS); AFLP, SNP markers; Goettingen Winter Bean Population (GWBP)