Portuguese Common Bean Natural Variation Helps to Clarify the Genetic Architecture of the Legume’s Nutritional Composition and Protein Quality

Abstract

Common bean is a nutritious food legume widely appreciated by consumers worldwide. It is a staple food in Latin America, and a component of the Mediterranean diet, being an affordable source of protein with high potential as a gourmet food. Breeding for nutritional quality, including both macro and micronutrients, and meeting organoleptic consumers’ preferences is a difficult task which is facilitated by uncovering the genetic basis of related traits. This study explored the diversity of 106 Portuguese common bean accessions, under two contrasting environments, to gain insight into the genetic basis of nutritional composition (ash, carbohydrates, fat, fiber, moisture, protein, and resistant starch contents) and protein quality (amino acid contents and trypsin inhibitor activity) traits through a genome-wide association study. Single-nucleotide polymorphism-trait associations were tested using linear mixed models accounting for the accessions’ genetic relatedness. Mapping resolution to the gene level was achieved in 56% of the cases, with 102 candidate genes proposed for 136 genomic regions associated with trait variation. Only one marker-trait association was stable across environments, highlighting the associations’ environment-specific nature and the importance of genotype × environment interaction for crops’ local adaptation and quality. This study provides novel information to better understand the molecular mechanisms regulating the nutritional quality in common bean and promising molecular tools to aid future breeding efforts to answer consumers' concerns.

High Inter- and Intra- Diversity of Amino Acid Content and Protein Digestibility Disclosed in Five Cool Season Legume Species with a Growing Market Demand

“…The arginine and the homoarginine produced enzymatically, from arginine and lysine, by AGAT (arginine: glycine amidinotransferase) activity have been negatively associated with adverse cardiovascular events and cardiovascular mortality [ 39 ]. Although the protein characterization was performed in just one environment, the considerable variability detected among the studied traits in Córdoba highlights the genetic richness of the studied grain legume collections and at least their potential for specific local breeding [ 17 , 40 ].…”

Non-starch polysaccharides from kidney beans: comprehensive insight into their extraction, structure and physicochemical and nutritional properties

“…11,55,56 Comparatively, a much higher average RS content of 45.23% was observed in the Córdoba region compared to the 30.74% in the Cabrela region in 106 kidney bean accessions from Portugal. 57 Heat stress exposure in Córdoba may contribute to the higher RS content than the mild climate environment in Cabrela. The abovementioned observations suggest that both the genotype and planting environment influence the carbohydrate content and distribution, and particularly heat stress contributes to RS accumulation during seed filling.…”

Resistant starch in common beans: Concentration, characteristics, uses and health effects. A systematic map and review of the studies from 1962 to 2023

“…A wealth of conditions including site of cultivation, milling procedure, moisture, genotype, cooking, fermentation, leavening agent and storage conditions can affect RS concentration in beans (Kutos et al ., 2003; Martín‐Cabrejas et al ., 2004; Vargas‐Torres et al ., 2004a, 2004b, 2006; Aguilera et al ., 2009; Yadav et al ., 2010a; Li et al ., 2011; Ovando‐Martínez et al ., 2011b; Piecyk et al ., 2012, 2013; Liu et al ., 2013; Arce‐Arce et al ., 2014; Hooper et al ., 2017, 2019, 2021; Santiago‐Ramos et al ., 2018; Escobedo et al ., 2020; Bento et al ., 2021; Loader et al ., 2021; Mendes et al ., 2021; Choe et al ., 2022; Guldiken et al ., 2022). However, studies on the role of the agronomic management on the RS concentration are almost absent, with the exception, in the present work, of two reports on the water availability (Herrera et al ., 2021; Salas‐Lumbreras et al ., 2023), both of which found that terminal drought, but not a restricted irrigation during the whole cycle, reduced the RS concentration in two common bean genotypes compared to a full irrigation during the whole cycle.…”

“…Notably, a recent genome wide association mapping highlighted 4 genetic markers of the RS concentration in a bean population composed of 106 accessions from Portugal grown in a multi‐environmental trial (Mendes et al ., 2021). The latter authors showed that varying the environment consisted in a variation from 30.7% ± 3.5% to 45.2% ± 11.4%, with higher values in drier areas and with only mild differences in the seed moisture, across the genotypic set used.…”