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Identification of Quantitative Trait Locus for Seed Dormancy and Expression Analysis of Four Dormancy-Related Genes in Sorghum

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Abstract

Seed dormancy is an important trait during the domestication of major crops. Dormant seeds are unable to germinate under conditions normally suitable for non-dormant seeds. Quantitative trait loci (QTLs) and genes affecting seed dormancy in sorghum remain largely unknown. To identify the genomic regions controlling seed dormancy in sorghum, we produced two F2 segregating populations from two crosses between a deep dormant weedy line B140 (as the female parent) and two weak dormant grain lines CK60B and MS138B (as the male parents). A genetic linkage map of the B140/CK60B population was constructed with 216 simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers spanning 1710.3 cM. One QTL on chromosome 4 and two QTLs on chromosome 7 were identified in the B140/CK60B population. They accounted for 17.9 to 24.9% of the phenotypic variance using a simple interval mapping method. The QTL on chromosome 4 was verified in another F2 mapping population (MS138B/B140). To understand the mechanism of dormancy, we conducted an expression analysis of four sorghum genes encoding homologs of dormancy genes of other plant species: Vp1 (maize), DOG1 (Arabidopsis), qSD12 and Sdr4 (rice). We demonstrated that there were clear differences in the expression level of all these four genes between the two parental lines with different seed dormancy level, and their expression were also tissue-specific with the expression levels of qSD12 low throughout all growth stages and tissues in B140. Our findings will help to define the genetic mechanism of seed dormancy in sorghum, and the identified QTLs may be useful biomarker for selection in sorghum improvement programs.

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Acknowledgments

We thank Dr. Mingli Wang at the Plant Genetic Resources Conservation Unit, US Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service and two anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments on this manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Plant Genetics and Breeding, College of Agronomy and Biotechnology, China Agricultural University, 2 Yuanmingyuan West Road, Beijing, 100193, China

    Yan Guo, Pan Li, Lubin Tan, Yongcai Fu, Zuofeng Zhu, Fengxia Liu, Chuanqing Sun & Hongwei Cai

  2. Beijing Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement and Genome, Ministry of Agriculture, 2 Yuanmingyuan West Road, Beijing, 100193, China

    Yan Guo, Pan Li, Lubin Tan, Yongcai Fu, Zuofeng Zhu, Fengxia Liu, Chuanqing Sun & Hongwei Cai

  3. Forage Crop Research Institute, Japan Grassland Agricultural and Forage Seed Association, 388-5 Higashiakada, Nasushiobara, Tochigi, 329-2742, Japan

    Nana Yuyama & Hongwei Cai

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  1. Yan Guo
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  2. Pan Li
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Correspondence to Hongwei Cai.

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Communicated by: Ray Ming

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Table S1

Markers segregating distortion in the B140/CK60B F2 population. (DOCX 46 kb)

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Guo, Y., Li, P., Yuyama, N. et al. Identification of Quantitative Trait Locus for Seed Dormancy and Expression Analysis of Four Dormancy-Related Genes in Sorghum. Tropical Plant Biol. 8, 9–18 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12042-015-9146-z

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