• DOI:10.1002/csc2.20300
• Corpus ID: 225470264

Novel sources of drought tolerance from landraces and wild sorghum relatives

@article{Ochieng2020NovelSO,
  title={Novel sources of drought tolerance from landraces and wild sorghum relatives},
  author={Grace Ochieng and Kahiu Ngugi and Lydia N. Wamalwa and Eric Manyasa and Nicoleta Muchira and Desterio Nyamongo and D. Odeny},
  journal={Crop Science},
  year={2020}
}

• G. Ochieng, Kahiu Ngugi, +4 authors D. Odeny
• Published 5 November 2020
• Biology
• Crop Science

Funding information CGIARGrainLegumes andDrylandCereals;KenyaNationalResearchFund;CROP TRUST Abstract Sorghum (Sorghum bicolor [L.] Moench) is the fifth most important cereal crop worldwide and second aftermaize (ZeamaysL.) in Kenya. It is an important food security crop in arid and semi-arid lands, where its production potential is hampered by drought. Drought tolerance can bemeasured by a plant’s ability to resist premature senescence, often described as stay-green. This study was carried out with the objective of identifying novel stay-green trait among wild and landrace genotypes of sorghum. Forty-four sorghumgenotypes that included 16 improved, nine landraces, and 17 wild relatives of sorghum alongside known stay-green sources, B35 and E36-1, were evaluated under well-watered and water-stressed conditions in an alpha-lattice design of three replications. Data was collected on plant height (PHT), flag leaf area (FLA), panicle weight (PWT), 100-seed weight (HSW), relative chlorophyll content (RCC), number of green leaves at maturity (GLAM), days to 50% flowering (DFL), and grain yield (YLD). Genetic diversity was determined using diversity arrays technology (DArT) sequencing and quality control (QC) markers were generated using a java script. Lodoka, a landrace, was the most drought-tolerant genotype, recorded the highest numbers of RCC and GLAM, and outperformed B35 and E36-1 in yield under water-stress and well-watered conditions. The RCC was highly correlated with GLAM (r = .71) and with yield-related traits, HSW (r = .85), PWT (r = .82), and YLD (r = .78). All traits revealed high heritability (broad-sense) ranging from 60.14 to 98.4% for RCC and DFL, respectively. These results confirm earlier reports that wild relatives and landraces are a good source of drought tolerance alleles.