A study of the genetic diversity in the world soybean collection using microsatellite markers associated with fungal disease resistance

Abstract

Background. Soybean (Glycine max (L.) Merr.) gradually becomes one of the leading legume crops in Kazakhstan. The area under soybeans in the country has been increasing annually and requires the development of adapted cultivars with a higher yield, improved quality characters, and resistance to emerging fungal diseases. The enlargement of the crop’s gene pool also suggests the need to study and document local soybean accessions to meet the standards of the available world soybean collection by using reliable and informative types of DNA markers.Materials and methods. In this study, the soybean collection consisting of 288 accessions from different countries, including 36 cultivars and promising lines from Kazakhstan, was studied. The molecular genetic analysis was performed using nine polymorphic SSR (simple sequence repeats) markers, seven of which (Satt244, Satt565, Satt038, Satt309, Satt371, Satt570 and Sat_308) were associated with resistance to three main fungal diseases of soybean – frogeye leaf spot, fusarium root rot, and purple seed stain.Results. The average PIC (polymorphism information content) value of the analyzed SSR markers constituted 0.66 ± 0.07, confirming their highlevel polymorphism. The principal coordinate analysis suggested that the local accessions were genetically most close to the accessions from East Asia. As the collection showed a robust resistance to three studied fungal diseases in Almaty Region during 2018–2019, the distribution of the studied SSR markers in the population was not significantly associated with resistance to the analyzed diseases under field conditions.Conclusion. SSR genotyping of the soybean collection helped to identify accessions that potentially possess resistance-associated alleles of fungal disease resistance genes. The data obtained can be further used for the development of DNA documentation and the breeding the promising cultivars and lines of soybean.

Genetic Diversity Analysis of Soybean Collection Using Simple Sequence Repeat Markers

“…One of the ways to assess the genetic background behind this trait is through the application of informative types of DNA markers, including simple sequence repeats (SSR, also known as microsatellites) and single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) markers. In the past decades, SSR and SNP markers have been widely used to study genetic diversity [15][16][17][18] and search for associations between markers and traits [19,20]. Both SSRs and SNPs are ubiquitous in the genome of most crops and, therefore, potentially useful to determine the genetic structure of a population and study the evolutionary history and phylogenetic relationships of species.…”

“…Additionally, identifying SSR markers associated with PH and yield can contribute to the development of high-yielding soybean cultivars by facilitating a marker-assisted selection (MAS) approach [12]. Previous studies have revealed the substantial genetic diversity of PH in soybean accessions collected from different geographic regions [20], and many reports indicate significant relationships between various SSRs and PH [27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44]. However, comprehensive investigations utilizing SSR markers specifically associated with plant adaptation traits across the world's soybean collection are still rare.…”

Genetic variation of soybean collection based on microsatellite DNA markers related to plant height

“…There are several reviews and articles on genetic diversity studies of soybean collections from Kazakhstan and other countries using SSR and other markers [26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33], including those associated with photoperiod, flowering time, seed maturation [26], and fungal diseases [27,28]. While soybean accessions were studied on susceptibility to fungal diseases and flowering time in relation to SSR markers [26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33], characterization of world collection including Kazakhstan's commercial cultivars and breeding material by specific markers associated with plant height has not been carried out. Thus, the purpose of this study was the evaluation of the world soybean collection, including Kazakhstan's accession, using informative molecular markers associated with plant height as well as other important yield-related traits.…”

Validation of Marker-Trait Associations in Six-Rowed Barley Lines Bred in Kazakhstan

“…In Kazakhstan, this approach was also successfully used in studies for productivity in barley [5,14], bread wheat [15-16], durum wheat [17], and soybean [18]. Also, similar studies were performed for disease resistance in bread and durum wheat [19][20], barley [21], and soybean [22][23]. Hence, previous studies of QTL identification for valuable traits in crops generated abundant information about a wide range of genetic loci and SNPs associated with the key agronomic traits.…”