ARS | Publication request: Characterization of resistance to Synchytrium endobioticum in cultivated potato accessions from the Vavilov Institute of Plant Industry (VIR) collection

Submitted to: Plant Breeding
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: June 7, 2012
Publication Date: November 2, 2012
Citation: Khiutti, A., Afanaskeno, O., Antonova, O., Shuvalov, 0., Novikova, L., Krylova, E., Chalaya, N., Mironenko, N., Spooner, D.M., Gavrileno, T. 2012. Characterization of resistance to Synchytrium endobioticum in cultivated potato accessions from the Vavilov Institute of Plant Industry (VIR) collection. Plant Breeding. 131:744-750.

Interpretive Summary: Cultivated potato is plagued by a variety of diseases, and one of the most serious of them is caused by a fungus and called potato wart. This disease is so serious that it is listed as a quarantine disease in 55 countries, meaning that potatoes cannot be moved across borders or sold if they have this disease. Losses in susceptible potato cultivars reach 50-100%. The aim of our study was to characterize the resistance to potato wart in a subset of the Russian National Potato collection that is under investigation for its use in breeding in a cooperative research program between the USDA and Russia. We also examined whether potato wart resistance was associated with different cultivated potato species, with the chromosome numbers possessed by different cultivated potato species, with a DNA marker that has been associated with resistance to this disease, or with the geographic region where these cultivated potato species were originally collected. Our work shows a lack of associations of potato wart disease to any of these factors, suggesting that the only way to choose resistant cultivars for potato breeding programs is through laborious tests of resistance of each potato collection.

Technical Abstract: The causal agent of potato wart (Synchytrium endobioticum) is an obligate parasitic chytrid fungus, and is included as a quarantine pathogen in 55 countries, with losses in susceptible cultivars reaching 50-100%. The aim of our study was to characterize resistance to S. endobioticum pathotype 1 in cultivated potatoes from a well characterized subset of the Russian National Potato collection and to determine whether this resistance is associated with cultivated potato species taxonomy, with ploidy, with geographic distance, or with a molecular marker Nl25-1400 proposed for molecular screening for resistance to pathotype 1 of S. endobioticum. Within the diversity of 52 landrace genotypes, our work shows a lack of such predictive associations with wart resistance. High intraspecific variation of wart diseases resistance allows the selection of extremely resistant and susceptible genotypes available for future genetic and breeding studies.