Differential response of wild and cultivated wheat

Authors: Yadhu Suneja Anil K Gupta Achla Sharma Navtej S Bains

Publish Date: 2015/03/14

Volume: 21, Issue: 2, Pages: 169-177

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Abstract

Wheat staple food crop of the world is sensitive to drought especially during the grainfilling period Water soluble carbohydrates WSCs stem reserve mobilization and higher invertase activity in the developing grains are important biochemical traits for breeding wheat to enhance tolerance to terminal drought These traits were studied for three accessions of Triticum dicoccoidesa tetraploid wheat progenitor species acc 7054 EC 171812 acc 7079 EC 171837 and acc 14004 G1943 M6 M selected previously on the basis of grain filling characteristics Check wheat cultivars PBW343 a popular bread wheat cultivar for irrigated environments and C306 widely adapted variety for rainfed agriculture were also included in this set Analysis of variance revealed significant genotypic differences for the content of water soluble carbohydrates activity of acid invertase and alkaline invertase Acc 7079 was found to be a very efficient mobilizer of water soluble carbohydrates 23643 mg g1 peduncle DW when averaged over irrigated and rainfed conditions Acid invertase activity revealed marked genotypic differences between wild and cultivated wheats Alkaline invertase activity was highest in Acc 7079 when pooled across both the environments On the whole acc 7079 qualifies as a suitable donor for enhancing tolerance of bread wheat to terminal drought The association of physiobiochemical differences observed with grain filling attributes on one hand and molecular markers on the other could be of use in improving wheat for water stress conditions

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