Browsing by Person "Bolduan, Christof"

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Genetic variation in early maturing European maize germplasm for resistance to ear rots and mycotoxin contamination caused by Fusarium spp.
(2010) Bolduan, Christof; Melchinger, Albrecht E.
Ear rots of maize, caused by Fusarium spp., are of major concern because they lead to losses in grain yield and contamination with mycotoxins which harm animals and humans. In the absence of other strategies, breeding maize for genetic resistance is currently the most promising avenue to control these rots and mycotoxin accumulation. The predominant pathogens in Central Europe are F. graminearum, the causative agent of Gibberella ear rot (GER), and F. verticillioides, the causative agent of Fusarium ear rot (FER). GER causes contamination with deoxynivalenol (DON), nivalenol and zearalenone (ZEA), whereas FER causes contamination with fumonisins (FUM). Information on the resistance to GER and FER and mycotoxin contamination is lacking for maize adapted to the cooler climatic conditions of Central Europe. In this study we investigated (1) the resistance of early maturing European elite inbred lines against GER and FER and contamination of mycotoxins, (2) the genetic variances and heritabilities for ear rot ratings and mycotoxin concentrations, (3) the correlations of ear rot ratings with mycotoxin concentrations, (4) the correlations between line per se (LP) and testcross performance (TP) for GER rating and DON concentration, (5) the aggressiveness of and mycotoxins produced by different isolates of F. graminearum and F. verticillioides, and (6) the potential of near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) to estimate concentrations of DON and FUM in maize grains under artificial inoculation. Significant genotypic variances and moderate to high heritabilities were found for GER, DON and ZEA among the inbred lines and for GER and DON among the testcrosses, as well as for FER and FUM among the inbred lines. Further, genotype x environment interaction variances were significant for all traits except FUM. Thus, the results underlined the presence of ample genotypic variation and the need to conduct multi-environment tests for reliable identification of resistant genotypes. Ear rot ratings and mycotoxin production of eight isolates each of F. graminearum and F. verticillioides differed significantly. Even though, isolate x inbred interactions were significant only in the case of F. graminearum, and no rank reversals occurred among the tested inbred lines. Most isolates differentiated the susceptible inbreds from the resistant ones for severity ratings. However, the differences between the two groups were smaller for the less aggressive isolates. Therefore, we recommend using a single, environmentally stable and sufficiently aggressive isolate for resistance screenings under artificial inoculation. Strong correlations between ear rot severity and mycotoxin concentrations indicated that selection for low ear rot severity under artificial inoculation will result in high correlated selection response for low mycotoxin concentration, particularly for GER and DON. Selection for ear rot severity is less resource-demanding and quicker than selection for mycotoxin concentration. Thus, it enables the breeder to maximize selection gain for a given budget. However, the selected elite material should be evaluated for mycotoxin concentrations in order to avoid ?false positives?. In this regard, NIRS showed high potential to predict DON concentrations in grain obtained from artificially inoculated maize. Compared to the commonly employed ELISA assay, NIRS assays are considerably cheaper, because no mycotoxin extractions and test kits are needed. We observed moderate positive correlations between GER and FER, and identified inbreds combining resistance to both ear rots. Therefore, selection for resistance to one pathogen is expected to result in indirect response to the other. Nevertheless, in advanced stages of each breeding cycle, lines preselected for other agronomically important traits should be evaluated for resistance to both pathogens. Genotypic variances for GER and DON were generally higher in LP than TP. Thus, assuming identical selection intensities for each scheme, the expected response to selection for LP should be higher than for TP. However, owing to moderate correlations between LP and TP for GER and DON, selection based on LP is not sufficient, because the ultimate goal is to develop resistant hybrids. Therefore, a multi-stage selection procedure is recommended with evaluation of agronomically promising lines for GER in only one environment in order to eliminate highly susceptible lines, followed by evaluation of TP of the selected lines for GER with one tester of moderate to high resistance level from the opposite heterotic pool in two to three environments.