Construction and analysis of 2 reciprocal Arabidopsis introgression line populations.

Two new large reciprocal sets of introgression lines (ILs) were created between the Arabidopsis accessions Col-0 and C24. In both sets (78 ILs with Col-0 background and 62 ILs with C24 background), the donor segments cover almost the entire genome with an average substitution size of 18.3 cM. In addition to the basic sets of ILs, further subILs were developed for 2 genomic regions allowing better mapping resolution. SubILs carrying donor segments with candidate genes for flowering time and reduced fertility were used to demonstrate the usefulness of the reciprocal ILs for quantitative trait loci detection and fine mapping. For subIL development at high resolution around the reduced fertility locus, we used modified CelI-based assays in one-well format for both marker development and genotyping. This serves as a very flexible and cost-effective approach.