Livinder Kaur

Marker-Assisted Backcrossing to Introgress Resistance to Fusarium Wilt Race 1 and Ascochyta Blight in C 214, an Elite Cultivar of Chickpea

Fusarium wilt (FW) and Ascochyta blight (AB) are two major constraints to chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) production. Therefore, two parallel marker‐assisted backcrossing (MABC) programs by targeting foc1 locus and two quantitative trait loci (QTL) regions, ABQTL‐I and ABQTL‐II, were undertaken to introgress resistance to FW and AB, respectively, in C 214, an elite cultivar of chickpea. In the case of FW, foreground selection (FGS) was conducted with six markers (TR19, TA194, TAA60, GA16, TA110, and TS82) linked to foc1 in the cross C 214 × WR 315 (FW‐resistant). On the other hand, eight markers (TA194, TR58, TS82, GA16, SCY17, TA130, TA2, and GAA47) linked with ABQTL‐I and ABQTL‐II were used in the case of AB by deploying C 214 × ILC 3279 (AB‐resistant) cross. Background selection (BGS) in both crosses was employed with evenly distributed 40 (C 214 × WR 315) to 43 (C 214 × ILC 3279) SSR markers in the chickpea genome to select plant(s) with higher recurrent parent genome (RPG) recovery. By using three backcrosses and three rounds of selfing, 22 BC3F4 lines were generated for C 214 × WR 315 cross and 14 MABC lines for C 214 × ILC 3279 cross. Phenotyping of these lines has identified three resistant lines (with 92.7–95.2% RPG) to race 1 of FW, and seven resistant lines (with 81.7–85.40% RPG) to AB that may be tested for yield and other agronomic traits under multilocation trials for possible release and cultivation.

Detection of quantitative trait loci for mungbean yellow mosaic India virus (MYMIV) resistance in mungbean (Vigna radiata (L.) Wilczek) in India and Pakistan

Yellow mosaic disease (YMD) is one of the major diseases affecting mungbean (Vigna radiata (L.) Wilczek). In this study, we report the mapping of the quantitative trait locus (QTL) for mungbean yellow mosaic India virus (MYMIV) resistance in mungbean. An F8 recombinant inbred line (RIL) mapping population was generated in Thailand from a cross between NM10-12-1 (MYMIV resistance) and KPS2 (MYMIV susceptible). One hundred and twenty-two RILs and their parents were evaluated for MYMIV resistance in infested fields in India and Pakistan. A genetic linkage map was developed for the RIL population using simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers. Composite interval mapping identified five QTLs for MYMIV resistance: three QTLs for India (qYMIV1, qYMIV2 and qYMIV3) and two QTLs for Pakistan (qYMIV4 and qYMIV5). qYMIV1, qYMIV2, qYMIV3, qYMIV4 and qYMIV5 explained 9.33%, 10.61%, 12.55%, 21.93% and 6.24% of variation in disease responses, respectively. qYMIV1 and qYMIV4 appeared to be the same locus and were common to a major QTL for MYMIV resistance in India identified previously using a different resistant mungbean.

Peroxidase: a marker for Ascochyta blight resistance in chickpea

On the basis of incidence of appearance of Ascochyta blight symptoms after artificial inoculation of 25-day-old chickpea seedlings with 10 different pathotypes of Ascochyta rabiei, GL94011, PBG5 and C214 have been classified as resistant, moderately resistant and susceptible, respectively, to Ascochyta blight. In none of the pathotypes, peroxidase (PO) activity could be detected in culture medium and mycelium. Healthy tissues of GL94011 have almost three times the PO activity in comparison with that of C214. Resistant and moderately resistant genotypes showed 30–60% upregulation of PO activity against infection by A. rabiei whereas it was only 3–6% in susceptible genotype C214. These results indicate the possibility of using PO as a marker of Ascochyta blight resistance.

Characterisation of Ascochyta rabiei isolates and evaluation of genotypic stability in chickpea

Ascochyta rabiei isolates were characterised for their variability using a set of host differentials following cloth chamber screening technique. Sixty chickpea genotypes were evaluated against the characterised 10 individual pathotypes separately to identify genotypes with stable resistance during 2007–2008. Twenty four genotypes showed resistance to all the pathotypes; whereas 18 genotypes were resistant to moderately resistant to these pathotypes. The above genotypes can be considered good sources of stable resistance and recommended as donors or for direct cultivation in north western plain zone of India.

Identifying environmental factors impacting yellow mosaic virus disease of green gram (Vigna radiata L.) Wilczek

The relationship between environmental factors and the incidence of yellow mosaic virus disease in green gram was studied for the period of 23 years using historical data on disease index (DI) and environmental factors from 1985 to 2007. The environmental factors showed consistently significant correlations with DI during the 29th–33rd standard meteorological week (SMW) periods and the same period was taken for further analysis. Among the environmental factors, maximum temperature was highly positively correlated (r = 0.63), followed by sunshine hours in SMW 29 (r = 0.48), with the disease. However, rainfall during SMW 30–33 (r = −0.38) and evening relative humidity during SMW 29–33 (r = −0.42) were negatively correlated with disease. As these four environmental factors contribute mainly to disease, same were used to develop the functional models by conducting multiple regression analysis for the period SMW 29–33. Among these, linear model gave highest R2 value (0.47) and this model was validated for the periods 2008–2010 and the predicted estimates were in full agreement with the observed estimates (R2 = 0.874).

Understanding syntonic relationship of foliar diseases of green gram with weather variables

Green gram with good adaptation to various eco-regions is extensively grown in India and other south Asian countries. Biotic stresses of viral, bacterial or fungal nature appear as major limiting factors which may occur singly, simultaneously, in combinations or in sequence in various eco-geographical zones. Weather variables have profound impacts on the disease occurrence, the interactions between weather variables and diseases based on long term data-sets, which can be used to point out the critical variables and the sensitive period in crop season for management practices. Good correlation was observed from 27 to 36th meteorological week (second week of July–first week of September) for the diseases such as bacterial leaf spot (BLS), Cercospora leaf spots (CLSs), Anthracnose (RLS) and weather variables. A close relationship of RF and RHe appeared with RLS, RHm, RHe and Tmin showed close relationship with BLS, whereas Tmax, SSh and RF showed a close relationship with CLS.

Status of resistance to Ascochyta blight and Fusarium wilt in large-seeded kabuli

Of the 390 Kabuli chickpea genotypes evaluated from 2005 to 2010 against Ascochyta blight (AB), Fusarium wilt (FW) and Dry root rot (DRR) resistance using standard screening techniques, 48 were found to be resistant to FW and DRR. Of these, four genotypes viz GLK95091, GLK95061, GLK24092 and GLK24096 showed resistance to AB with disease score less than 4.0 while another four genotypes GLK22072, GLK22098 and GLK24099 displayed AB disease score 5.0. GLK 22117 with FW percentage 6.3 and DRR 3.5 tested for seven years displayed good performance at other locations in India as well. Extra bold seeded genotypes GLK 26171, GLK26177 and GLK23001have shown good level of resistance to AB, FW and DRR and can be suggested as donors in crossing programme. It was observed that level of FW resistance was comparatively low in large-seeded and extra-large-seeded kabuli than small seeded kabuli.