Genetic dissection of the domestication syndrome in tetraploid wheat

Domestication of cereals, einkorn and emmer and barley, in Western Asia was the pivotal event in the ascent of agriculture. Understanding of this process is crucial for reason ranging from basic science to applied crop improvement. In order to describe genetic basis of domestication of emmer wheat, wild emmer accession PI428082 collected in the putative center of emmer domestication in Southeastern Turkey, was crossed with durum cv ‘Langdon’. A total of 523 recombinant inbred lines (RILs) and 323 backcross recombinant inbred lines (BRILs) were developed. The populations were grown in the field and 10 traits related to the domestication syndrome were analyzed. RILs were genotyped using the Illumina 9K wheat Infinium assay and genetic map containing 2,123 markers was constructed. Preliminary analyses yielded 26 significant QTLs, some of them already described. Of a particular interest are QTLs for economically important traits, such as seed size, in which genes from wild emmer resulted in phenotypes exceeding those of the domesticated parent.