Key message This study identified a significant number of QTL that are associated with FHB disease resistance in NMBU spring wheat panel by conducting genome-wide association study. Abstract Fusarium head blight (FHB) is a widely known devastating disease of wheat caused by Fusarium graminearum and other Fusarium species. FHB resistance is quantitative, highly complex and divided into several resistance types. Quantitative trait loci (QTL) that are effective against several of the resistance types give valuable contributions to resistance breeding. A spring wheat panel of 300 cultivars and breeding lines of Nordic and exotic origins was tested in artificially inoculated field trials and subjected to visual FHB assessment in the years 2013–2015, 2019 and 2020. Deoxynivalenol (DON) content was measured on harvested grain samples, and anther extrusion (AE) was assessed in separate trials. Principal component analysis based on 35 and 25 K SNP arrays revealed the existence of two subgroups, dividing the panel into European and exotic lines. We employed a genome-wide association study to detect QTL associated with FHB traits and identify marker–trait associations that consistently influenced FHB resistance. A total of thirteen QTL were identified showing consistent effects across FHB resistance traits and environments. Haplotype analysis revealed a highly significant QTL on 7A, Qfhb.nmbu.7A.2, which was further validated on an independent set of breeding lines. Breeder-friendly KASP markers were developed for this QTL that can be used in marker-assisted selection. The lines in the wheat panel harbored from zero to five resistance alleles, and allele stacking showed that resistance can be significantly increased by combining several of these resistance alleles. This information enhances breeders´ possibilities for genomic prediction and to breed cultivars with improved FHB resistance.

The present study was conducted to identify the nature and magnitude of genetic divergence among fifty five genotypes based on phenotypical traits using the multivariate analysis. Based on cluster analysis, the genotypes were best fitted into six clusters. The maximum and minimum genotypes grouped in cluster III (14) and minimum were in Cluster IV (4) respectively. The maximum intra-cluster distance was shown by cluster I (D2 2.543) indicating maximum difference among the genotypes within and the minimum value was shown by cluster II (D2 =1.827). Maximum value of inter-cluster distance (D2=6.471) was recorded between cluster I and cluster IV revealing that the genotypes of these clusters were highly diverse from others and can be used as divergent parents for hybridization and selection. Thus, for getting high heterosis for recovering transgressive segregants, genotypes from cluster I and IV can be used as distant parents in any breeding programme for successful pea improvement. The Optimum number of K-means clusters formed were four. The result of PCA revealed that all the four principal components (PC-I, PC-II, PC-III and PC-IV) contributed 86.7% of the total variability. The results of present study could be exploited in the future genetic improvement programme of pea genotypes in Uttar Pradesh region.

Fusarium head blight (FHB) is a widely known devastating disease of wheat caused by Fusarium graminearum and other Fusarium species. FHB resistance is quantitative, highly complex and divided into several resistance types. Quantitative trait loci (QTL) that are effective against several of the resistance types give valuable contributions to resistance breeding. A spring wheat panel of 300 cultivars and breeding lines of Nordic and exotic origins was tested in artificially inoculated field trials and subjected to visual FHB assessment in the years 2013 to 2015, 2019 and 2020. Deoxynivalenol (DON) content was measured on harvested grain samples and anther extrusion (AE) was assessed in separate trials. Principal component analysis based on 35K and 25K SNP arrays revealed the existence of two subgroups, dividing the panel into European and exotic lines. We employed a genome-wide association study to detect QTL associated with FHB traits and identify marker-trait associations (MTAs) that consistently influenced FHB resistance. Several MTAs were found to be significant for the FHB resistance. Of importance, haplotype analysis revealed a highly significant and consisted QTL on 7A, Qfhb.nmbu.7A.2, which was further validated on an independent set of breeding lines. Breeder-friendly KASP markers were developed for this QTL that can be used in marker-assisted selection. The lines in the wheat panel harboured from zero to five resistance alleles, and allele stacking showed that resistance can be significantly increased by combining several of these resistance alleles. This information enhances breeders´ possibilities for genomic prediction and to breed cultivars with improved FHB resistance.