A dwarf wheat mutant is associated with increased drought resistance and altered responses to gravity

Abstract

Drought resistance is an important trait for crops. Here we report a new wheat mutant with increased drought resistance and altered gravitropism. During the bombardment transformation of Chinese wheat cultivar ‘Jingdong 6’, a recessive remarkably dwarf wheat mutant named ‘s-dwarf’ (super dwarf wheat) was created. It was severely dwarf and gibberellic acid insensitive. The relative water loss ratio of the detached leaf and the transpiration rate of s-dwarf seedlings were remarkably lower than Jingdong 6 while the photosynthetic rate of s-dwarf seedlings was significantly higher than Jingdong 6. Most of the s-dwarf seedlings survived in recovering experiement after water loss. The stalk of s-dwarf seedling also showed reduced gravitropism. This is the first report about a new dwarf wheat mutant associated with increased drought resistance and altered stalk gravitropism.