Location: Plant Genetics Research
Project Number: 5070-21000-044-002-A
Project Type: Cooperative Agreement
Start Date: Oct 1, 2022
End Date: Oct 31, 2023
Objective:
Our experiments leveraged marker data for >19,000 accessions in the USDA germplasm collection. These efforts have paid off, and we have already reported several hundred genetic marker associations with our drought tolerance traits. We are actively applying genomic selection and have crossed PIs with these favorable traits with an elite public parental line and are developing multiple breeding populations containing the best possible alleles for multiple drought-associated traits. Our efforts will reach fruition during the lifetime of this grant; germplasm releases will serve to broaden the genetic base and deploy drought alleles in improved soybean genotypes that will provide valuable tools to commercial and public breeders and producers to meet the substantial challenges of increased incidence and severity of drought stress.
Approach:
Our previous research where USDA-GRIN lines with favorable drought associated traits were crossed to elite public parental line resulted in creation of multiple breeding populations containing the best possible alleles for multiple drought-associated traits. We also intercrossed among our populations to generate Multi-parent Advanced Generation InterCross (MAGIC) populations specific for drought tolerance traits. We intend to identify and release soybean germplasm which will serve to broaden the genetic base and deploy drought alleles in improved soybean genotypes. We have four activities that will be used to meet the objective:
1) Multi-location testing for yield/drought tolerance using G1F4:5 derived materials, created by repeated agronomic and genomic selection experiments.
2) Ongoing agronomic/genomic selection of MAGIC G4F4 populations towards future germplasm releases.
3) Genotype a single MAGIC G4F4:5 population, which combines multiple drought tolerance traits, for use in genetic mapping efforts.
4) Evaluate the potential utility and predictive ability of seed isotopic data in comparison to whole plant isotopic data, as an indirect measurement of water use efficiency and/or drought tolerance potential. Personnel from the ARS location in Missouri will have primary responsibility for overall project coordination and reports, for collecting and processing all genomic/genotypic data and for coordinating winter nursery advancement of all prospective
germplasm. ARS personnel in Missouri will also be primarily responsible for overseeing data analysis. Physiological and yield data will be collected by cooperators with the required physiological/breeding expertise at remote field locations (Arkansas, Missouri, Arizona). ARS personnel in Maricopa, AZ’s role is limited; they are responsible for performing a single field grow-out, using seed provided by the Missouri ARS location, of prospective germplasm releases. Maricopa ARS personnel will collect field data (agronomic, thermal camera, canopy wilting scores, etc.) and harvest and organize seed samples to be sent to ARS location in Missouri. Project partners will substantially share data collected and germplasm generated by this project. All germplasm used was derived from either public germplasm (USDA-GRIN) or from USDA germplasm which was provided via MTAs to non-ARS partners.
