Fusarium ear rot (FER), caused by Fusarium verticillioides (Sacc.) Nirenberg, is one of the major ear diseases that affect both yield and grain quality in maize (Zea mays L.), especially in tropical environments. Fusarium genetic resistance is a complex trait, controlled by several small‐effect genes and strongly influenced by the environment. We applied a comprehensive genome‐wide association study and genomic prediction for ear rot and starburst symptoms, using 291,633 high‐quality single nucleotide polymorphism (SNPs) markers in 320 tropical maize inbred lines, in two distinct locations in Brazil's southern region. Three SNPs were significantly associated with starburst symptoms, each associated with 6–8% of the phenotypic variance, and with gene models that have expression levels in ears, pericarp, and kernels, corresponding to disease infection period and suggesting some role in FER resistance. No significant SNP was associated with FER, which is an indication that the genetic architecture for this trait is highly polygenic, with potentially many variants having small effects that are not detectable in the association mapping analysis. We observed genomic prediction accuracies ranging from 0.34 to 0.4 for FER and starburst, respectively. Further research is required to validate these significant SNPs and their relationship to genes affecting FER resistance, and also to improve genomic prediction accuracies across different genetic backgrounds.

中文翻译：

---

热带玉米种质中枯萎病引起的穗腐病的关联图谱和基因组预测

Nirenberg镰刀菌（Fusarium v​​erticillioides）（Sacc。）引起的镰刀菌腐烂（FER）是影响玉米（Zea mays L.）产量和籽粒品质的主要穗病之一，特别是在热带环境中。镰刀菌遗传抗性是一个复杂的性状，受几个小效应基因控制，并受到环境的强烈影响。我们在巴西南部两个不同地区的320个热带玉米自交系中应用了291,633个高质量单核苷酸多态性（SNP）标记，对耳朵腐烂和星暴症状进行了全面的全基因组关联研究和基因组预测。三个SNP与星爆症状显着相关，每个与表型变异的6–8％有关，并且与在耳朵，果皮和果仁中具有表达水平的基因模型相对应，与疾病感染期相对应，并暗示在FER抗性中起作用。FER没有明显的SNP，这表明该性状的遗传结构是高度多基因的，可能具有许多在关联映射分析中无法检测到的具有很小影响的变体。我们观察到FER和星爆的基因组预测准确性分别为0.34至0.4。需要进一步的研究来验证这些重要的SNP及其与影响FER抗性的基因的关系，并改善不同遗传背景下的基因组预测准确性。