Location: Crop Genetics Research
Project Number: 6066-21220-016-006-S
Project Type: Non-Assistance Cooperative Agreement
Start Date: Aug 1, 2022
End Date: Jul 31, 2027
Objective:
The persistence of high night temperature (HNT) over extended periods during the crop cycle can potentially impact a wide range of physiology, growth, and developmental processes in soybean. The routes through which high day temperature and HNT inducing yield and quality losses differ. Asymmetric increase in the daytime and its impact on crop production has been explored, but a similar emphasis has not been given to HNT in soybean. Despite the adverse effects of HNT on the source-sink relationship, the phenotypic and genetic basis of soybean tolerance to HNT is unexplored. We propose to (i) quantify soybean physiology in response to HNT at mid-pod filling, (ii) determine genetic variability in tolerance to HNT during pod filling (seed weight, size, and quality), and (iii) identify promising traits/donors inducing HNT resilience for developing climate-resilient soybean varieties.
Approach:
The long-term goal of this research is to link phenome to the genome to reduce the high night temperature (HNT) impact on soybean yield and quality losses. A divergent set of soybean accessions will be grown until peak bloom in the control condition, and then replicate plants will be moved for control and HNT stress (5°C warm night than the control during pod filling) treatments to quantify the impact of HNT covering post-flowering [R3] and pod-filling stages [R8]. Physiological responses of soybean to HNT during the mid-pod filling stage will be recorded. To ascertain the impact of HNT on soybean, plants will be hand-harvested for recording pod or seed number, seed weight, and seed size. Seeds obtained will be used to determine the impact of HNT on protein, oil percent, and oleic content using high-throughput Near-Infrared Spectroscopy. Finally, we determine which traits among the accessions are best suited for screening HNT tolerance in soybean.
