Integration of genetic and genomics resources in einkorn wheat enables precision mapping of important traits

Gautam Saripalli, Laxman Adhikari, Cameron Amos, Ashraf Masood Kibriya, Hanin Ahmed, Matthias Heuberger, John Raupp, Naveenkumar Athiyannan, Thomas Wicker, Michael Abrouk, Sydney Wallace, Seyedali Hosseinirad, Parveen Chhuneja, Janelle Livesay, Nidhi Rawat, Simon G. Krattinger, Jesse Poland, Vijay Tiwari

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

5 Scopus citations

Abstract

Einkorn wheat (Triticum monococcum) is an ancient grain crop and a close relative of the diploid progenitor (T. urartu) of polyploid wheat. It is the only diploid wheat species having both domesticated and wild forms and therefore provides an excellent system to identify domestication genes and genes for traits of interest to utilize in wheat improvement. Here, we leverage genomic advancements for einkorn wheat using an einkorn reference genome assembly combined with skim-sequencing of a large genetic population of 812 recombinant inbred lines (RILs) developed from a cross between a wild and a domesticated T. monococcum accession. We identify 15,919 crossover breakpoints delimited to a median and average interval of 114 Kbp and 219 Kbp, respectively. This high-resolution mapping resource enables us to perform fine-scale mapping of one qualitative (red coleoptile) and one quantitative (spikelet number per spike) trait, resulting in the identification of small physical intervals (400 Kb to 700 Kb) with a limited number of candidate genes. Furthermore, an important domestication locus for brittle rachis is also identified on chromosome 7A. This resource presents an exciting route to perform trait discovery in diploid wheat for agronomically important traits and their further deployment in einkorn as well as tetraploid pasta wheat and hexaploid bread wheat cultivars.
Original languageEnglish (US)
JournalCommunications Biology
Volume6
Issue number1
DOIs
StatePublished - Aug 12 2023

Bibliographical note

KAUST Repository Item: Exported on 2023-09-01
Acknowledgements: The authors acknowledge the funding support (Grant No. 2022-67013-36362) received from the National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) for conducting this study. Facilities provided by the Department of Plant Science and Landscape and Architecture, University of Maryland and Center for Desert Agriculture, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) are also greatly acknowledged. The authors thank Dr. Bikram Gill and the Wheat Genetics Resource Center at Kansas State University for providing some useful germplasm.

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