Molecular genetic analysis of natural introgression to enhance chestnut blight resistance of Castanea henryi var. omeiensis

Abstract

Castanea species have enormous potential for broad applications in the biomedical sciences and chemical wood industries. Due to the occurrence of fungal diseases, especially chestnut blight, the survival status of Castanea plants is seriously threatened. Castanea plants in China have natural tolerance to chestnut blight. This study investigated the genetic diversity and chestnut blight resistance of Castanea plants in China and searched for germplasm with high tolerance resistance. Cluster and population structure analysis revealed that wild Castanea plants in China could be divided into three groups with significant interspecific boundary, C. henryi var. omeiensis is located between C. mollissima and C. henryi var. henryi. The ABBA-BBAA test showed that significant gene introgression occurred between C. mollissima and C. henryi in Mount Emei, supporting the conclusion that C. henryi var. omeiensis as a natural hybrid resource. The results of disease resistance evaluation showed that the tolerance of wild C. mollissima to chestnut blight was the highest and significantly higher than that of wild C. henryi and C. seguinii. In particular, there is a strong association between disease tolerance in C. henryi var. omeiensis and the level of genetic introgression from C. mollissima. Then, the rIBD fragments of C. henryi var. omeiensis derived from C. mollissima were analyzed to reveal the source of disease resistance using whole genome resequencing data. A total of 203 rIBD segments containing 435 genes were identified. Finally, 41 candidate genes for chestnut blight resistance were selected through multiple omics. In conclusion, this study investigated a type of interspecific disease-resistant hybrid resources, identified a set of candidate genes for chestnut blight resistance, and provided new strategies for disease-resistant breeding of chestnut resources in the future.