Abstract
Key messageWUE phenotyping and subsequent QTL analysis revealed cytosolic GS genes importance for limiting N loss due to photorespiration under well-watered and well-fertilized conditions.Potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) closes its stomata at relatively low soil water deficits frequently encountered in normal field conditions resulting in unnecessary annual yield losses and extensive use of artificial irrigation. Therefore, unraveling the genetics underpinning variation in water use efficiency (WUE) of potato is important, but has been limited by technical difficulties in assessing the trait on individual plants and thus is poorly understood. In this study, a mapping population of potatoes has been robustly phenotyped, and considerable variation in WUE under well-watered conditions was observed. Two extreme WUE bulks of clones were identified and pools of genomic DNA from them as well as the parents were sequenced and mapped to reference potato genome. Following a novel data analysis approach, two highly resolved QTLs were found on chromosome 1 and 9. Interestingly, three genes encoding isoforms of cytosolic glutamine synthase were located in the QTL at chromosome 1 suggesting a major contribution of this enzyme to photosynthetic efficiency and thus WUE in potato. Indeed, Glutamine synthetase enzyme activity of leaf extracts was measured and found to be correlated with contrasting WUE phenotypes.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1007/s00122-015-2573-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
Potato is the third most important food crop worldwide (FAOSTAT 2013)
The mapping population of 144 clones together with two parental lines was phenotyped for photosynthetic water use efficiency (WUE) and irrigation WUE
No significant differences could be observed in E; water use (WU) was significantly photosynthetic WUE (pWUE) (A/E) distribution Irrigation WUE (iWUE) (DM/WU) distribution
Summary
Potato is the third most important food crop worldwide (FAOSTAT 2013). It has a higher WUE potential thanTheor Appl Genet (2015) 128:2143–2153 cereals (Vreugdenhil et al 2007), has a high harvest index, and is a very space efficient crop potentially producing roughly twice as many calories per hectare than cereals (FAOSTAT 2013); a desirable fact in a future scenario of limited agricultural land. Potato is the third most important food crop worldwide (FAOSTAT 2013). It has a higher WUE potential than. Potato is sensitive to even mild water stress It closes its stomata at relatively low soil water deficits, which results in a considerable higher yield decrease compared to cereals (Porter et al 1999). Potatoes are unique as a crop species in the sense that it is the only major crop, where a stolon-derived tuber serves as a sink organ. It is not known how accurately information gained from studies on other crops (e.g., the closely related tomato) or model plants such as Arabidopsis thaliana can be transferred to potato
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