Association mapping for water use efficiency in soybean identifies previously reported and novel loci and permits genomic prediction.

Soybean is a major legume crop cultivated globally due to the high quality and quantity of its seed protein and oil. However, drought stress is the most significant factor that decreases soybean yield, and more than 90% of US soybean acreage is dependent on rainfall. Water use efficiency (WUE) is positively correlated with the carbon isotopic ratio C/C (C13 ratio) and selecting soybean varieties for high C13 ratio may enhance WUE and help improve tolerance to drought.

Identification of genomic regions associated with the plasticity of carbon 13 ratio in soybean.

Improving water use efficiency (WUE) for soybean [Glycine max (L.) Merr.] through selection for high carbon isotope (C13) ratio may increase drought tolerance, but increased WUE may limit growth in productive environments.

Identification and Confirmation of Loci Associated With Canopy Wilting in Soybean Using Genome-Wide Association Mapping.

Drought causes significant soybean [ (L.) Merr.] yield losses each year in rain-fed production systems of many regions.

Evaluation of cowpea mini core accessions for resistance to flower bud thrips Trybom (Thysanoptera: Thripidae).

The flower bud thrips, Trybom (Thysanoptera: Thripidae), is an economically important pest of cowpea in sub-Saharan Africa. Varietal resistance is the most preferred, environmentally friendly, cost-effective and sustainable option for controlling this pest. The objective of this study was to identify sources of resistance to among mini core accessions from the largest world cowpea germplasm collection maintained at the International Institute of Tropical Agriculture (IITA).

Super Annigeri 1 and improved JG 74: two Fusarium wilt-resistant introgression lines developed using marker-assisted backcrossing approach in chickpea ( L.).

Annigeri 1 and JG 74 are elite high yielding desi cultivars of chickpea with medium maturity duration and extensively cultivated in Karnataka and Madhya Pradesh, respectively. Both cultivars, in recent years, have become susceptible to race 4 of Fusarium wilt (FW). To improve Annigeri 1 and JG 74, we introgressed a genomic region conferring resistance against FW race 4 () through marker-assisted backcrossing using WR 315 as the donor parent.

Advances in genetics and molecular breeding of three legume crops of semi-arid tropics using next-generation sequencing and high-throughput genotyping technologies.

Molecular markers are the most powerful genomic tools to increase the efficiency and precision of breeding practices for crop improvement. Progress in the development of genomic resources in the leading legume crops of the semi-arid tropics (SAT), namely, chickpea (Cicer arietinum), pigeonpea (Cajanus cajan) and groundnut (Arachis hypogaea), as compared to other crop species like cereals, has been very slow. With the advances in next-generation sequencing (NGS) and high-throughput (HTP) genotyping methods, there is a shift in development of genomic resources including molecular markers in these crops.

Constitutive and inducible resistance to Atherigona soccata (Diptera: Muscidae) in Sorghum bicolor.

Host plant resistance is one of the important components for minimizing the losses because of sorghum shoot fly, Atherigona soccata (Diptera: Muscidae) attack. Therefore, we studied the constitutive and inducible biochemical mechanisms of resistance to A. soccata in a diverse array of sorghum genotypes to identify lines with diverse mechanisms of resistance to this insect.

Large-scale development of cost-effective SNP marker assays for diversity assessment and genetic mapping in chickpea and comparative mapping in legumes.

A set of 2486 single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) were compiled in chickpea using four approaches, namely (i) Solexa/Illumina sequencing (1409), (ii) amplicon sequencing of tentative orthologous genes (TOGs) (604), (iii) mining of expressed sequence tags (ESTs) (286) and (iv) sequencing of candidate genes (187). Conversion of these SNPs to the cost-effective and flexible throughput Competitive Allele Specific PCR (KASPar) assays generated successful assays for 2005 SNPs. These marker assays have been designated as Chickpea KASPar Assay Markers (CKAMs).