Zahirul Talukder, Brent Hulke, Lili Qi, Thomas Jr. Gulya
Abstract: The need for sunflower quantitative genetics research to find and capture Sclerotinia resistance is increasing with every year that this disease results in widespread losses in yield and crop quality. Our efforts to perform association mapping with the 260 Plant Introductions (PIs) obtained from the North Central Regional Plant Introduction Station of USDA-ARS in Ames, IA, are moving forward. We have finished data analysis on the phenotypic data. Based on the distribution of data, which is more broadly and normally distributed than we were expecting, we believe that the phenotypes will be adequate for mapping using the association mapping model. We are currently completing the development of a marker set for our resistance candidate genes and 10,000 random SNPs from a companion project. This will contribute the necessary genotypes with which we can complete our association model. As soon as all the genotyping is complete, we can run our association analysis, discover marker-trait associations for stalk rot [Sclerotinia Initiative funded this research].
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