Emeline Dossa

Genome-wide association analysis of grain yield and Striga hermonthica and S. asiatica resistance in tropical and sub-tropical maize populations

Emeline N. Dossa, Hussein Shimelis, and Admire I. T Shayanowako

School of Agricultural, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Private Bag X01, Scottsville, Pietermaritzburg 3209, South Africa

This study reports novel QTL and related genes for Striga asiatica and S. hermonthica resistance in maize. No QTL associated with dual resistance was found, suggesting that breeding maize must be specific for resistance to each Striga species using germplasm adapted to the endemic region of each parasite.

 

 

Fig. 3 Plots showing linkage disequilibrium (LD) heatmap (A) and intra-chromosomal LD decay (B) for 126 maize genotypes using 16,000 SNP markers. Note: in Figure A the triangle on the right diagonal revealed the squared correlation coefficients (r2 ). At the same time, the P values are shown on the lower diagonal of the triangle for each marker pair. In Figure B, the horizontal blue line indicates the 95th percentile distribution of unlinked r2, while the red cover shows the locally estimated scatterplot smoothing (LOESS) illustrating the LD decay.