Abstract
Potato has about 100 related wild Solanum species growing naturally in the Americas. Solanum jamesii (jam), native to the southwest USA and Mexico, has many valuable traits for breeding, but making hybrids is extremely difficult. We investigated the approach of using the bridge species Solanum verrucosum (ver). A survey of all ver populations in the US Potato Genebank identified the best females. The standard bridge crossing technique using emasculation of ver and “mentor” double pollination after first pollinating with jam was very inefficient for most ver because: 1) emasculation depressed seedset in ver females, 2) despite very careful emasculation many accidental ver selfs resulted, and 3) mentor pollination produced many unwanted hybrids with the mentor pollen parent. We therefore produced populations of ver by backcrossing five generations into tuberosum cytoplasm. The BC5 lines are very vigorous in growth and flowering, but having very low male fertility and complete self-incompatibility they can be mass crossed with jam pollen without emasculation. Even with no mentor pollen, most pistils of verBC5 pollinated with jam produce a small fruit with an average of less than one normal seed. Resulting seedlings were confirmed ver-jam hybrids by DNA markers.
Resumen
La papa tiene cerca de 100 especies silvestres de Solanum relacionadas que crecen de forma natural en las Américas. Solanum jamesii (jam) es nativa del suroeste de EUA y México, tiene muchas caracteristicas importantes para mejoramiento, sin embargo generar híbridos es extremadamente difícil. Nosotros investigamos la estrategia de usar Solanum verrucosum (ver) como especie puente. Una evaluación de todas las poblaciones de ver en el Banco de Germoplasma de Papa de EUA identificó a las mejores plantas maternas. La técnica estándar de hacer un cruzamiento puente mediante la emasculación de ver y la doble polinización del “mentor” después de la primera polinización con jam fue muy ineficiente para la mayoría de ver debido a: 1) la emasculación debilitó producción de semillas en plantas maternas de ver, 2) a pesar de una emasculación muy cuidadosa, muchas ver fueron accidentalmente autofecundadas, y 3) la polinización del mentor produjo muchos híbridos no deseados con el polen del mentor parental. Por ello nosotros producimos poblaciones de ver mediante retrocruza de cinco generaciones en citoplásma de tuberosum. Las líneas BC5 son muy vigorosas en crecimiento y floración, pero debido a que tienen muy baja fertilidad masculina y completa autoincompatibilidad, pueden cruzarse masivamente con el polen de jam sin emasculación. Aun sin polen del mentor, la mayoría de los pistilos de verBC5 polinizados con jam producen un fruto pequeño con un promedio de menos de una semilla normal. Las plántulas resultantes se confirmaron como híbridos ver-jam mediante marcadores de ADN.
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Abbreviations
- USPG:
-
US Potato Genebank;
- GRIN:
-
Germplasm Resources Information Network (https://npgsweb.ars-grin.gov/gringlobal/search)
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Acknowledgments
We thank Mrs. Renee Sauer for help in making crosses and recording data, as well as the University of Wisconsin Peninsular Agricultural Research Station program and staff for their cooperation. The US Potato Genebank, like most other genebanks, keeps stocks that have all combinations of potential usefulness and accessibility. The extreme potential usefulness of S. jamesii made increasing its current low accessibility through improved crossing techniques an attractive target.
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Bamberg, J., Kielar, A., del Rio, A. et al. Making Hybrids with the Wild Potato Solanum jamesii. Am. J. Potato Res. 98, 187–193 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12230-021-09828-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12230-021-09828-1