Abstract
Sugarcane (Saccharum spp.) is an important economic crop, supplying up to 80% of the table sugar and ~60% of bio-ethanol worldwide. Due to population growth and dwindling fossil-fuel reserves, the demand for sugar and bio-ethanol requires significant improvement in sugarcane production. Breeding sugarcane cultivars with high-performance agronomic traits is undoubtedly the most efficient way to achieve this goal. Therefore, evaluating agronomic traits and dissecting underlying loci are critically important for this aim steps in providing genetic resources and molecular markers for selection. In this study, we assembled a diversity panel of 236 elite sugarcane germplasms originally collected from 12 countries. We evaluated 28 agronomic traits in the diversity panel with three replicates. The diversity panel was genotyped using amplified fragment length polymorphism markers, and a total of 1,359 markers were generated. Through the genome-wide association study, we identified three markers significantly associated with three traits evaluated at a stringent threshold (P < 0.05 after Bonferroni correction). The genotypes of the three associated markers grouped respective trait values into two distinct groups, supporting the reliability of these markers for breeding selection. Our study provides putative molecular markers linked to agronomic traits for breeding robust sugarcane cultivars. Additionally, this study emphasized the importance of sugarcane germplasm introduced from other countries and suggested that the use of these germplasms in breeding programs depends on local industrial needs.
Highlights
IntroductionAs an efficient C4 crop, sugarcane (Saccharum spp.) provides up to 80% of the table sugar and ~60% of bio-ethanol worldwide [1]
Between categorical and continuous traits, AngLamCul was positively correlated with fiber content (Fiber), sugar content (Sugar), and ProTiller, Cotton positively correlated with tiller rate (TillerR), Height, and ProTiller, and Pith was positively correlated with Height and ProTiller, whereas both InterShape and Cotton were negatively correlated with Diameter, and BudPlace was negatively correlated with ProTiller
The results indicated that the same or similar parental lines from different countries were already used in sugarcane breeding programs, reflecting a certain level of germplasm exchange across the world leading to close pedigrees between accessions from different countries
Summary
As an efficient C4 crop, sugarcane (Saccharum spp.) provides up to 80% of the table sugar and ~60% of bio-ethanol worldwide [1]. The crop is mainly cultivated in tropical and sub-tropical areas in over 100 countries covering ~27.1 million ha with a total harvest of 1.9 billion metric tons/year [2,3,4]. Due to human population growth and dwindling fossil-fuel reserves, the demand for sugar and bio-ethanol requires significant improvement in sugarcane production. Genetic analysis of sugarcane team (No 2014HC015) and Overseas top talents project Sugarcane genetic improvement and extension to YZ, Central Public-interest Scientific Institution Basal Research Fund for Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences (No 1630052019001) to FZ, Central Public-interest Scientific Institution Basal Research Fund for Chinese Academy of Tropical Agricultural Sciences (No 1630052017020-4), the Applied Basic Research Projects in Yunnan Province (No 2016FB071) and Applied Basic Research Projects of Yunnan Academy of Agricultural Sciences (No YJM201705) to ZW, and the ’One Hundred Person’ Project of Guangxi to XY
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