Genomic basis of drought resistance in Fagus sylvatica

  • In the course of global climate change, central Europe is experiencing more frequent and prolonged periods of drought. The drought years 2018 and 2019 affected European beeches (Fagus sylvatica L.) differently: even in the same stand, drought damaged trees neighboured healthy trees, suggesting that the genotype rather than the environment was responsible for this conspicuous pattern. We used this natural experiment to study the genomic basis of drought resistance with Pool-GWAS. Contrasting the extreme phenotypes identified 106 significantly associated SNPs throughout the genome. Most annotated genes with associated SNPs (>70%) were previously implicated in the drought reaction of plants. Non-synonymous substitutions led either to a functional amino acid exchange or premature termination. A SNP-assay with 70 loci allowed predicting drought phenotype in 98.6% of a validation sample of 92 trees. Drought resistance in European beech is a moderately polygenic trait that should respond well to natural selection, selective management, and breeding.

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Metadaten
Author:Markus PfenningerORCiDGND, Friederike ReußGND, Angelika Kiebler, Philipp SchönnenbeckORCiD, Cosima Caliendo, Susanne GerberORCiDGND, Berardino CocchiararoORCiD, Sabrina Reuter, Nico BlüthgenORCiDGND, Karsten ModyORCiDGND, Bagdevi Mishra, Miklós BálintORCiDGND, Marco ThinesORCiDGND, Barbara FeldmeyerORCiDGND
URN:urn:nbn:de:hebis:30:3-728851
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.12.04.411264
Parent Title (English):bioRxiv
Document Type:Preprint
Language:English
Date of Publication (online):2021/04/23
Date of first Publication:2021/04/23
Publishing Institution:Universitätsbibliothek Johann Christian Senckenberg
Release Date:2023/06/01
Article Number:080721
Page Number:21
Institutes:Angeschlossene und kooperierende Institutionen / Senckenbergische Naturforschende Gesellschaft
Biowissenschaften / Institut für Ökologie, Evolution und Diversität
Dewey Decimal Classification:5 Naturwissenschaften und Mathematik / 58 Pflanzen (Botanik) / 580 Pflanzen (Botanik)
Sammlungen:Universitätspublikationen
Licence (German):License LogoCreative Commons - CC BY-NC-ND - Namensnennung - Nicht kommerziell - Keine Bearbeitungen 4.0 International