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ARS Home » Midwest Area » Urbana, Illinois » Soybean/maize Germplasm, Pathology, and Genetics Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #197805
Title: PROGRESS IN MAPPING QTL CONTROLLING YIELD IN SOYBEAN

Author
item DIERS, BRIAN - UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS
item Nelson, Randall
item CURLEY, JOSEPH - UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS
item CHAKRABORTY, NANDA - UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS
item GUZMAN, PETER - MONSANTO

Submitted to: Biennial Conference on Molecular and Cellular Biology of the Soybean
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: 7/15/2006
Publication Date: 8/6/2006
Citation: Diers, B., Nelson, R.L., Curley, J., Chakraborty, N., Guzman, P. 2006. Progress in mapping QTL controlling yield in soybean [abstract]. Biennial Conference on Molecular and Cellular Biology of the Soybean. p. 21.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Seed yield is the most important trait for both breeders and producers and is controlled by a complex set of factors including the physiological efficiency of the plant, the environment, disease, seed composition, and plant maturity. The economic importance of yield is the impetus to understand the genetic control of this trait and quantitative trait loci (QTL) mapping has made this possible. In the ten yield QTL mapping studies in the literature, 54 marker-yield associations are reported. Many of these QTL also are associated with traits, such as maturity and disease resistance. For example, the region on linkage group C2 containing the maturity gene e1 was associated with yield in seven out of ten studies in the literature. These associations may indicate the indirect effect on yield of these agronomic traits or they may identify a closely linked locus, but they do raise the question of how to define a yield QTL. We are interested in mapping yield QTL in order to identify alleles from exotic germplasm that could increase soybean yields in commercial cultivars. We have mapped yield QTL in seven populations that each has a parent with exotic ancestry. In these populations, we identified 18 genomic regions of exotic origin that are associated with yield increases. For 5 of these 18 regions, there was no previous report in the literature of a yield QTL nor was there an association with an agronomic trait that may be indirectly increasing yield. We are attempting to confirm these yield QTL alleles in new populations and if successful, they will be useful in increasing the yield of North American commercial cultivars.