High Degree of Genetic Variation of Winter Hardiness in a Panel of Beta vulgaris L.

Abstract

Growing sugar beet (Befa vulgaris L. subsp, vulgaris [sugar beet cultivar group]) as a winter crop requires the development of a winter sugar beet with controlled bolting and sufficient winter hardiness. To evaluate the genetic variation for winter hardiness in B. vulgaris L,, we determined the survival rate (SR) in a panel of 396 accessions tested in eight overwintering field trials in Germany and Belarus, The panel included the cultivar groups sugar beet, fodder beet, garden beet, and leaf beet, as well as the wild beet B. vulgaris subsp, marítima (L.) Arcang. (BVM), Across all environments the effects of accession, environment, and accession x environment interaction were highly significant. Despite the complexity of the trait, the heritability for SR was estimated as A)2 = 0.81, reflecting a large genetic variation in the panel. Environmental SRs ranged from 0,7 to 86,3% with a grand mean of 28,4%, In all environments at least one accession completely died while the maximum SR ranged from 39,9 to 100%, On average, sugar beet accessions performed best while accessions with the highest SR were among BVMs and leaf beets. The largest variation for SR was found in BVMs, followed by the leaf beets, whereas sugar beets showed the smallest variation. Our results suggest that winter hardiness in sugar beet is sufficient to survive mild winters but needs to be improved for continental climates with colder winters. Whether the limited variation in sugar beet is sufficient for this has to be further investigated.M. KirchhofF, C.Jung, and FJ, Kopisch-Obuch, Plant Breeding Institute, Christian-Albrechts-

EcoTILLING in Beta vulgaris reveals polymorphisms in the FLC-like gene BvFL1that are associated with annuality and winter hardiness

“…Across all four environments, bolting rates for the 41 accessions ranged from 0.05 to 0.75 (Figure 1). Variation for survival rate survival rate after winter across eight environments in 2008/09 and 2009/10 was described in detail by Kirchhoff et al [32], and ranged from 0.07 to 0.66. On average, sugar beet accessions performed best (0.39) while fodder beet and garden beet performed worst (0.24 and 0.19, respectively).…”

“…This panel had been phenotyped before for variation in the occurrence of bolting before winter (i.e. in the absence of vernalization) and survival rates after winter [32]. As candidate genes we chose (i) BTC1 and (ii) BvFT1 , because of their known functions in the regulation of vernalization requirement and response in beet, and (iii) BvFL1 , because of the regulatory role of its homolog FLC in both vernalization and cold stress response in Arabidopsis.…”

Genetic analysis of bolting after winter in sugar beet (Beta vulgaris L.)

“…In overwintering field trials in 2008/2009 with 396 B. vulgaris accessions described by Kirchhoff et al (2012), sugar beet accession BETA 1773 showed a high level of post-winter bolting resistance across three locations. Fifty percent of the plants of this accession did not bolt until middle of June of the second year when the experiment was completed (unpublished data).…”

A review of air disturbance technology for plant frost protection

“…As a result, plants in temperate regions have developed mechanisms to endure the low temperature stress during winter [17][18][19] . But the ability of the plant to resist frost can be measured by the lethal temperature of plant tissue [20,21] . The temperature is generally regarded as the one at which about 50% to 90% of plants' reproductive organs could be killed [22][23][24] .…”