title: Genome-wide Association Study Identifies New Loci for Resistance to Sclerotinia Stem Rot inBrassica napus.
abstract: Sclerotinia stem rot (SSR) caused by the necrotrophic fungusSclerotinia sclerotiorumis a major disease in rapeseed (Brassica napus) worldwide. Breeding for SSR resistance inB. napus, as in other crops, relies only on germplasms with quantitative resistance genes. A better understanding of the genetic basis for SSR resistance inB. napusthus holds promise for the genetic improvement of disease resistance. In the present study, a genome-wide association study (GWAS) for SSR resistance inB. napuswere performed using an association panel of 448 accessions genotyped with theBrassica60K Infinium®single-nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) array. A total of 26 SNPs corresponding to three loci,DSRC4,DSRC6, andDSRC8were associated with SSR resistance. Haplotype analysis showed that the three favorable alleles for SSR resistance exhibited cumulative effects. After aligning SSR resistance quantitative trait loci (QTL) identified in the present and previous studies to theB. napusreference genome, one locus (DSRC6) was found to be located within the confidence interval of a QTL identified in previous QTL mapping studies and another two loci (DSRC4andDSRC8) were considered novel loci for SSR resistance. A total of 39 candidate genes were predicted for the three loci based on the GWAS combining with the differentially expressed genes identified in previous transcriptomics analyses.
authors.affiliation: National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Huazhong Agricultural UniversityWuhan, China; Jiangsu Provincial Key Laboratory of Crop Genetics and Physiology, Yangzhou UniversityYangzhou, China.
authors.forename: Jian
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Wu
authors.affiliation: National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Huazhong Agricultural University Wuhan, China.
authors.forename: Qing
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.affiliation: National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Huazhong Agricultural University Wuhan, China.
authors.forename: Sheng
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Huazhong Agricultural University Wuhan, China.
authors.forename: Muhammad
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Shahid
authors.affiliation: National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Huazhong Agricultural University Wuhan, China.
authors.forename: Lei
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Lan
authors.affiliation: National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Huazhong Agricultural University Wuhan, China.
authors.forename: Guangqin
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Cai
authors.affiliation: National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Huazhong Agricultural University Wuhan, China.
authors.forename: Chunyu
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Huazhong Agricultural University Wuhan, China.
authors.forename: Chuchuan
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Fan
authors.affiliation: Jiangsu Provincial Key Laboratory of Crop Genetics and Physiology, Yangzhou University Yangzhou, China.
authors.forename: Youping
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, Huazhong Agricultural University Wuhan, China.
authors.forename: Yongming
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zhou
keywords: Brassica napus; Sclerotinia sclerotiorum; genome-wide association study; quantitative trait loci; transcriptomics