Abstract
BackgroundWith increasing winter temperatures, Barley yellow dwarf virus (BYDV) is expected to become an increasing problem in maize cultivation in Germany. Earlier studies revealed that BYDV has a negative impact on maize performance. Molecular markers would accelerate the development of BYDV resistant maize. Therefore, the objectives of this study were (i) the identification of quantitative trait loci (QTL) for BYDV resistance in five connected segregating maize populations in a field experiment and (ii) their comparison with the QTL detected under greenhouse conditions.ResultsIn linkage analyses of the traits virus extinction, infection rate, and the symptom red edges, a highly associated major QTL was identified on chromosome 10. This QTL explained 45% of the phenotypic variance for the traits virus extinction and infection rate and 30% for the symptom red edges.ConclusionWe could show that BYDV resistance traits are oligogenically inherited. The QTL on chromosome 10 could be observed in the connected linkage analyses and in the single population analyses. Furthermore, this QTL could also be confirmed in the greenhouse experiment. Our results let suggest that this QTL is involved in multiple virus resistance and the markers are promising for marker assisted selection.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12870-015-0420-x) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
With increasing winter temperatures, Barley yellow dwarf virus (BYDV) is expected to become an increasing problem in maize cultivation in Germany
The assessments made in the greenhouse and the field experiments correlated significantly (α = 0.01) positive with ρ = 0.43 for EX and ρ = 0.44 for infection rate (IR) (Figure 1)
A genome region on chromosome 10 was identified in a linkage mapping approach with five connected segregating populations explaining 45% of the phenotypic variance for BYDV resistance traits
Summary
Barley yellow dwarf virus (BYDV) is expected to become an increasing problem in maize cultivation in Germany. Molecular markers would accelerate the development of BYDV resistant maize. The objectives of this study were (i) the identification of quantitative trait loci (QTL) for BYDV resistance in five connected segregating maize populations in a field experiment and (ii) their comparison with the QTL detected under greenhouse conditions. Zea mays L. plays an important role as a summer host for the aphid-transmitted Barley yellow dwarf virus (BYDV) [1]. With increasing winter temperatures due to climate change, aphids overwinter anholocyclic. This leads to an earlier development of aphid populations with a higher number of aphids in spring. Aphids infect plants in early developmental stages [2], in which maize reacts with strong growth reduction on BYDV infection because of an incomplete organ development [1]
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