Genetic studies of frost resistance in wheat

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Abstract
Genetic studies of frost resistance were performed on various wheat varieties using diallel, F2 monosomic and substitution analysis. A six-parental cross including reciprocals was carried out, and F1 hybrids and their parents were used for the freezing tests under controlled conditions. Both the general combining ability (GCA) and the specific combining ability (SCA) were significant, indicating additive and non-additive gene action in the inheritance of frost resistance. The high GCA∶SCA ratio revealed a preponderance of additive genetic variance. No significant reciprocal differences were found between the reciprocal crosses. The variance/covariance graphical analysis indicated the partial dominance of frost sensitivity. Frost sensitive varieties had the largest number of dominant genes, while frost resistant varieties had the highest proportion of recessive genes. The magnitude of the additive component of variation was higher than that of the dominance component, and the overall measure of the degree of dominance was smaller than one, so average dominance is incomplete. The increasing and decreasing alleles are not equally frequent at all loci. In this set of wheat varieties the values of narrow and broad heritability are relatively high. F2 monosomic analysis of the winter wheat variety ‘Arthur’ crossed with the monosomics of ‘Chinese Spring’ revealed that the average frost resistance of all the 21 monosomics was lower than that of the disomic. F2 monosomic hybrids 5A, 2B, 4B and 5D proved to be relatively frost resistant, while monosomics 3A, 3B and 6D were the most sensitive. The control of frost resistance in the set of chromosome substitution lines of the variety ‘Cheyenne’ into ‘Chinese Spring’ (with the exception of 2B) indicated that the genes responsible for the frost resistance of ‘Cheyenne’ are localised in chromosomes 5A, 7A, 4B, 5B, 4D and 5D. The genetic basis of frost resistance and problems of analysis are discussed.