| Summary: | Fall-sown barley will be increasingly important in the era of climate change due to higher yield potential and efficient use of water resources. Resistance/tolerance to biotic and abiotic stresses will be critical. Low temperature is an abiotic stress of great importance. Resistance to barley stripe rust (incited by Puccinia striifomis f. sp. hordei) and scald (incited by Rhynchosporium secalis) will be important in higher rainfall areas. Simultaneous gene discovery and breeding will accelerate the development of agronomically relevant germplasm. The role of FR-H1 and FR-H2 in low temperature tolerance (LTT) has been well documented. However the question still remains: is LTT due only to FR-H1 and FR-H2 or are there other, undiscovered, determinants of this critical trait? We developed two doubled haploid mapping populations using two lines from the University of Nebraska (NE) with superior cold tolerance and one line from Oregon State University (OR) with good malting quality and disease resistance: NB3437f/OR71 (facultative x facultative) and NB713/OR71 (winter x facultative). Both were genotyped with a custom 384 oligonucleotide pool assay (OPA). QTL analyses were performed for LTT, vernalization sensitivity (VS), and resistance to barley stripe rust and scald. Disease resistance QTL were identified with favorable alleles from both NE and OR germplasm. The role of VRN-H2 in VS was confirmed and a novel alternative winter allele at VRN-H3 was discovered in the Nebraska germplasm. FR-H2 was identified as a determinant of LTT and a new QTL, FR-H3, was discovered on chromosome 1H that accounted for up to 48% of the phenotypic variation in field survival at St. Paul, Minnesota, USA. The discovery of FR-H3 is a significant advancement in barley LTT genetics and will assist in developing the next generation of fall-sown varieties. === Graduation date: 2012
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