Mining of the national gene bank collection identifies resistance sources for loose smut of wheat in Northern Himalayan conditions

摘要

Loose smut caused by Ustilago tritici is an important disease of wheat. During the year 2017–18, 2018–19 and 2019–20, a total of 586 wheat germplasm accessions, comprising of 287 indigenous and 299 exotic accessions, were evaluated against loose smut disease under artificial epiphytotic conditions. Out of these, 58 accessions were found immune with zero infection of loose smut, whereas, 22 and 32 accessions were found highly resistant and resistant, respectively during 2018–19. When these 112 resistant accessions were further inoculated artificially to reconfirm their resistance during 2019–20, only 48 accessions were found immune, however, 06 were highly resistant and 05 accessions showed resistant reaction to loose smut. These resistant accessions can be used as a source of donors for evolving resistant varieties against loose smut disease in future breeding programme and also for the genomics assisted gene discovery. This is the first report of loose smut disease resistance in the national gene bank collection of India under North Western Himalayan conditions.