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ARS Home » Southeast Area » Fort Pierce, Florida » U.S. Horticultural Research Laboratory » Citrus and Other Subtropical Products Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #342229
Research Project: Quality, Shelf-life and Health Benefits for Fresh, Fresh-cut and Processed Products for Citrus and Other Tropical/Subtropical-grown Fruits and Vegetables

Location: Citrus and Other Subtropical Products Research

Title: Rapid volatile metabolomics and genomics in large strawberry populations segregating for aroma

Author
item BARBEY, C - University Of Florida
item FOLTA, K - University Of Florida
item WHITAKER, V - University Of Florida
item VERNA, S - University Of Florida
item Bai, Jinhe

Submitted to: Acta horticulturae
Publication Type: Proceedings
Publication Acceptance Date: 2/1/2017
Publication Date: 4/1/2017
Citation: Barbey, C.R., Folta, K.M., Whitaker, V.M., Verna, S., Bai, J. 2017. Rapid volatile metabolomics and genomics in large strawberry populations segregating for aroma. Acta Horticulturae. 1156:695-702. doi:10.17660/ActaHortic.2017.1156.102.

Interpretive Summary: Three volatile organic compound (VOC)-related segregating phenotypes were discovered using a non-targeted, ion-wise alignment approach. This method enabled a rapid and accurate depiction of the population-wide VOC metabolome in strawberry. The breadth of this analysis allowed facile generation of agronomically useful descriptive data about the population, including the covariance of volatile sensory compounds and their abundances with respect to time and the environment.

Technical Abstract: Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) in strawberry (Fragaria spp.) represent a large portion of the fruit secondary metabolome, and contribute significantly to aroma, flavor, disease resistance, pest resistance and overall fruit quality. Understanding the basis for volatile compound biosynthesis and its regulation is of great importance for the genetic improvement of cultivated varieties. Due to the complexity of the autoallooctoploid strawberry genome and the large influence of environmental factors over volatile expression, genetic studies on strawberry volatile biosynthesis typically require large segregating populations that are continually resampled for volatile expression. This data complexity frequently limits discovery to a small number of volatiles of ideal behavior and simple genetics. To address these problems and others, we demonstrate the ability to rapidly generate and describe the population-wide strawberry volatile metabolome through spectral reconstruction of unsupervised mass-aligned peaks. This approach generates unbiased, populationwide quantitative data suited for identifying segregating compounds as well as multivariate statistical tests and network analyses. Using this approach, we determined a number of quantitatively segregating volatiles which were used subsequently in quantitative trait locus (QTL) analysis. We further demonstrate the application of a single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) genotyping array with the power to resolve recombination events in the autoallooctoploid background.