Genome-wide association study uncovers new genetic loci and candidate genes underlying seed chilling-germination in maize

PeerJ

article

Yinchao Zhang¹  Peng Liu¹  Chen Wang¹  Na Zhang¹  Yuxiao Zhu¹  Chaoying Zou¹  Guangsheng Yuan¹  Cong Yang¹  Shibin Gao¹  Guangtang Pan¹  Langlang Ma¹  Yaou Shen¹ 

[1] Maize Research Institute, Sichuan Agricultural University

关键词: Maize;    Chilling stress;    Seed germination;    Genome-wide association study;    Candidate genes;   

DOI  :  10.7717/peerj.11707

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: Inra

【 摘 要 】

As one of the major crops, maize (Zea mays L.) is mainly distributed in tropical and temperate regions. However, with the changes of the environments, chilling stress has become a significantly abiotic stress affecting seed germination and thus the reproductive and biomass accumulation of maize. Herein, we investigated five seed germination-related phenotypes among 300 inbred lines under low-temperature condition (10 °C). By combining 43,943 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs), a total of 15 significant (P < 2.03 ×  10-6) SNPs were identified to correlate with seed germination under cold stress based on the FarmCPU model in GWAS, among which three loci were repeatedly associated with multiple traits. Ten gene models were closely linked to these three variations, among which Zm00001d010454, Zm00001d010458, Zm00001d010459, and Zm00001d050021 were further verified by candidate gene association study and expression pattern analysis. Importantly, these candidate genes were previously reported to involve plant tolerance to chilling stress and other abiotic stress. Our findings contribute to the understanding of the genetic and molecular mechanisms underlying chilling germination in maize.

【 授权许可】

CC BY