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Both additivity and epistasis control the genetic variation for fruit quality traits in tomato

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Abstract

The effect of a gene involved in the variation of a quantitative trait may change due to epistatic interactions with the overall genetic background or with other genes through digenic interactions. The classical populations used to map quantitative trait loci (QTL) are poorly efficient to detect epistasis. To assess the importance of epistasis in the genetic control of fruit quality traits, we compared 13 tomato lines having the same genetic background except for one to five chromosome fragments introgressed from a distant line. Six traits were assessed: fruit soluble solid content, sugar content and titratable acidity, fruit weight, locule number and fruit firmness. Except for firmness, a large part of the variation of the six traits was under additive control, but interactions between QTL leading to epistasis effects were common. In the lines cumulating several QTL regions, all the significant epistatic interactions had a sign opposite to the additive effects, suggesting less than additive epistasis. Finally the re-examination of the segregating population initially used to map the QTL confirmed the extent of epistasis, which frequently involved a region where main effect QTL have been detected in this progeny or in other studies.

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Acknowledgments

We are grateful to anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments. Many thanks to A. Gautier for genotypic and phenotypic works, to the greenhouse experimental team for plant cultivation, to A. M. Cossalter for taking care of the plants and for her help during the phenotypic evaluations, to P. Duffé for plant genotyping, to R. Matthieu for chemical evaluations and to C. Dillmann for SAS programs. Thanks to Vilmorin for providing lines and the trial in Ledenon. Laurent Lecomte was partly supported by the Conseil Régional Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur (France). The experiments comply with the current French laws.

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  1. Frédéric Hospital

    Present address: Laboratoire de Physique Théorique et Modèles Statistiques, Université Paris Sud, UMR8626, Bâtiment 100, Orsay Cedex, 91405, France

Authors and Affiliations

  1. INRA, UR1052, Unité de Génétique et Amélioration des Fruits et Légumes, Domaine Saint-Maurice, 84143, Montfavet, France

    Mathilde Causse, Jamila Chaïb & Laurent Lecomte

  2. INRA, UMR408 Sécurité et Qualité des Produits d’Origine Végétale, Domaine Saint-Paul, 84914, Avignon, France

    Michel Buret

  3. INRA, UMR de Génétique Végétale, Ferme du Moulon, 91190, Gif-sur-Yvette, France

    Frédéric Hospital

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  1. Mathilde Causse
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  2. Jamila Chaïb
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  3. Laurent Lecomte
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Correspondence to Mathilde Causse.

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Communicated by Q. Zhang.

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Causse, M., Chaïb, J., Lecomte, L. et al. Both additivity and epistasis control the genetic variation for fruit quality traits in tomato. Theor Appl Genet 115, 429–442 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00122-007-0578-1

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