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Harnessing Wheat Fhb1 for Fusarium Resistance

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Fusarium head blight (FHB), caused by the fungus Fusarium graminearum, is an economically devastating disease of wheat worldwide. Fhb1, a widely used genetic source of FHB resistance, originated in East Asia. The recent cloning of Fhb1 opens a new avenue to improve FHB resistance in wheat and potentially other crops.

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Role of Fhb1 Carrier in Breeding Wheat for FHB Resistance

FHB is a fungal disease of cereals, mainly affecting wheat and barley. Since the first epidemics reported on wheat in 1884 in the UK, FHB has become a major disease in most wheat-producing areas. It causes significant reductions in grain yield and quality, costing farmers billions of dollars each year worldwide [1]. Despite intensive searches, no completely resistant germplasm has been identified. Sumai 3, a Chinese wheat cultivar and known Fhb1 carrier, is recognized as the best source of FHB

Molecular Identification of Fhb1

Among several quantitative trait loci for FHB resistance identified in Sumai 3, only Fhb1 consistently shows a major effect on FHB resistance, making it attractive for wheat breeding [1]. The molecular isolation of the gene was hampered by the complexity of FHB resistance and hexaploid nature of the wheat genome. In 2016, Rawat et al. [3] reported that a pore-forming toxin-like (PFT) gene was the candidate for Fhb1 among 13 putative genes (Figure 1) using positional cloning, mutation analysis,

Practical Breeding Strategies

Although the precise genetic basis of Fhb1 remains uncertain, scientists have developed diagnostic molecular markers that are useful for selection in regions where FHB is less prevalent and phenotypic selection is challenging 4, 10. The markers allow breeders to predict the presence of Fhb1 in leading cultivars (Figure 1) and to select the best Fhb1 carrying genotypes. Marker-assisted selection (MAS) underpinned by ‘seed chipping’ and barcoding technologies combined with speed breeding that

Enabling Technologies for Accelerating Genetic Improvement

Using conventional approaches, breeders can now easily transfer Fhb1 into elite wheat, but it may be difficult to remove linkage drag in certain genetic backgrounds resulting from suppressed recombination in the target region [9]. However, transgenesis can overcome this limitation [12]. Since Fhb1 could be a gene complex, transformation of a multigene cassette with His, PFT, and other genes, might confer more stable FHB resistance than the transfer of a single gene. Gene editing is perhaps

Acknowledgments

We are grateful to Dr Robert McIntosh (University of Sydney) for useful suggestions. We acknowledge financial support from the National Key Research and Development Program of China (2016YFD0101802, 2016YFE0108600), Agricultural Science and Technology Innovation Program of CAAS, and the BBSRC cross-institutional strategic program Designing Future Wheat (BB/P016855/1).

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