Increasing iron and zinc in rice grains using deep water rices and wild species – identifying genomic segments and candidate genes
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Keywords
rice, biofortification, iron, zinc, quantitative trait loci, candidate genes, non-transgenic
Abstract
Large genetic variation exists for grain iron and zinc in rice germplasm including wild species and deep water rices. Conventional breeding is an easy and acceptable approach to biofortify rice. Analysis of 126 rice accessions using atomic absorption spectrophotometry showed that Fe concentration in brown rice ranged from 6 ppm in Athira to 72 ppm in O. nivara and Zn concentration from 27 ppm in Jyothi to 67 ppm in O. rufipogon. Quantitative trait loci (QTL) for high Fe and Zn concentration in grains were mapped from 3 wild progenitors and 2 deep water rices with the aim of gene discovery and also to develop iron/zinc-rich lines of two widely grown, popular rice varieties Swarna (MTU7029) and Samba Mahsuri (BPT5204) through conventional breeding approaches
References
Swamy B.P.M., Kaladhar K., Anuradha K., Batchu A.K., Longvah T., Viraktamath B.C., Sarla N. (2011) Enhancing iron and zinc concentration in rice grains using wild species. ADNAT Convention and International Symposium on Genomics and Biodiversity, CCMB, Hyderabad 23–25 Feb 2011, Abstracts p. 71.
Financial support from Indian Council of Agricultural Research, Network project on Functional genomics of crops (NPTC/FG/05/2672/33-3019)and Department of Biotechnology, Govt of India (BT/AB/FG-2(PH-II)/2009) to SN and CSIR-UGC fellowship to BPMS is gratefully acknowledged.