Identifying the Molecular Basis of Stripe Rust Adult Plant Resistance in Wheat

Finding the efficient way to control pathogenic fungi is an important goal for decreasing impute costs and ecological impact of fungicide application. Cultivars with strong resistance show insignificant yield losses even without fungicide applications. Stripe rust caused by Puccinia striiformis f. sp. triticiis one of the most devastating wheat disease with up to 100% of yield loss reported on susceptible cultivars.  

This study is being undertaken to identify the gene/genes responsible for the high temperature adult plant resistance (HTAP) to stripe rust observed in the spring wheat Louise. Main goal is to elucidate gene interactions between wheat and fungus on the transcriptome level. Development of perfect molecular markers that can be used in marker assisted selection for introgression of the resistance will be the application of these findings. Genetic component comprised of 188 recombinant inbred lines (F5:6) Louise by Penawawa cross which underwent phenotypic selection on resistance levels. Plants were inoculated with highly virulent stripe rust race PST-100. Poly (A) RNA libraries from resistant/susceptible, inoculated/non-inoculated samples combination were sequenced using Ion Torrent NGS technology. Bioinformatics analysis revealed differential expression patterns for both wheat and fungus. Here we are presenting putative regions with chromosome map positions that confers adult plant resistance in wheat along with insights on wheat-rust interaction mechanisms.