Quality Trait Gene Discovery in Beans

点击翻译按钮获取中文摘要

Knowledge of the genomic regions that control key agronomic and quality traits in crop plants, and the genes that they contain, are the bases for modern plant breeding programs. In the last 6 years we developed a pedigree database of bean varieties of different market classes released in Canada since 1930, sequenced and assembled the complete genome of OAC Rex (a disease resistant white bean variety that is in the pedigree of many of our recently commercialized varieties) and characterized loci contributing to: common bacterial blight resistance, folate content, a non-darkening seed coat trait and yield. This work was done with germplasm and structured populations developed to advance our bean breeding program. We released more than 20 beans lines that were supported for registration by the Ontario Pulse Crop Committee and commercialized more than 10 varieties in multiple market classes, including: white navy, small red, dark red kidney, light red kidney, black and cranberry beans.*******The common dry bean (Phaseolus vulgaris) is the staple food for more than 300 million people worldwide. Eighteen million tons of beans are harvested globally with an estimated value of $11 billion. Canadian bean production of 300,000 tons/ year is worth more than $250 M. Beans also contribute to Canadian society through their beneficial effects on human health and their positive effects on the environment through their ability to fix atmospheric nitrogen. Beans are considered to be the nearly perfect food because they have high protein contents, large amounts of fibre, and complex carbohydrates, as well as vitamins and cancer-fighting antioxidants. Therefore, biofortification, through breeding and selection, can contribute to the health of Canadians and lead to reductions in health care costs. ******The proposed work will contribute to our long-term research goal, which is to understand agronomic and quality-related traits in common bean. Through these studies we hope to define the molecular controls of these important traits and develop molecular tools to enable their rapid deployment in bean breeding. We will test the hypotheses that candidate genes we identified in previous work at loci for CBB resistance, folate content, yield and non-darkening seed coat, are the genes that control the traits. The work will be conducted with unique genetic materials developed by our breeding program and will provide interdisciplinary training for highly qualified personnel in applied molecular biology, genomics, bioinformatics and plant breeding research.*******Although the individual gene studies that are proposed are distinct they are united by the ultimate goal of our bean breeding program, which is to bring together the best productivity, stress tolerance, composition and appearance characteristics into exceptional genotypes. All these traits need to be improved, simultaneously, to develop plant varieties that can claim wide grower acceptance and international consumer recognition.******