Western Barley Genetics Alliance, Western Australian State Agricultural Biotechnology Centre, School of Veterinary and Life Sciences, Murdoch University, Murdoch, WA, Australia.
Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development, Agriculture and Food, South Perth, WA, Australia.
Plant Biotechnol J. 2019 May;17(5):932-944. doi: 10.1111/pbi.13029. Epub 2018 Dec 6.
Barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) is a major cereal grain widely used for livestock feed, brewing malts and human food. Grain yield is the most important breeding target for genetic improvement and largely depends on optimal timing of flowering. Little is known about the allelic diversity of genes that underlie flowering time in domesticated barley, the genetic changes that have occurred during breeding, and their impact on yield and adaptation. Here, we report a comprehensive genomic assessment of a worldwide collection of 895 barley accessions based on the targeted resequencing of phenology genes. A versatile target-capture method was used to detect genome-wide polymorphisms in a panel of 174 flowering time-related genes, chosen based on prior knowledge from barley, rice and Arabidopsis thaliana. Association studies identified novel polymorphisms that accounted for observed phenotypic variation in phenology and grain yield, and explained improvements in adaptation as a result of historical breeding of Australian barley cultivars. We found that 50% of genetic variants associated with grain yield, and 67% of the plant height variation was also associated with phenology. The precise identification of favourable alleles provides a genomic basis to improve barley yield traits and to enhance adaptation for specific production areas.
大麦（Hordeum vulgare L.）是一种广泛用于牲畜饲料、酿造麦芽和人类食品的主要谷物。谷物产量是遗传改良的最重要目标，在很大程度上取决于开花的最佳时间。对于控制驯化大麦开花时间的基因的等位基因多样性、在育种过程中发生的遗传变化，以及它们对产量和适应性的影响，我们知之甚少。在这里，我们根据对 895 个大麦品种的目标重测序，对全球大麦品种进行了全面的基因组评估。我们使用一种通用的靶向捕获方法，在 174 个与开花时间相关的基因中检测到全基因组多态性，这些基因是根据大麦、水稻和拟南芥的先验知识选择的。关联研究确定了新的多态性，这些多态性解释了与开花时间和谷物产量相关的表型变异，以及由于澳大利亚大麦品种的历史育种而导致的适应性提高。我们发现，与谷物产量相关的遗传变异中有 50%，与株高变化相关的有 67%，也与开花时间相关。有利等位基因的精确鉴定为改良大麦产量性状和提高特定生产地区的适应性提供了基因组基础。
