Poster: Epidemiology: Climate Change
609-P
Screening some rust universal-susceptible wheat varieties for ozone tolerance and some applications.
A. MASHAHEET (1), D. Marshall (2), K. Burkey (2), A. Abdelrhim (1), F. Ullah (1) (1) North Carolina State University, U.S.A.; (2) USDA-ARS, North Carolina State University, U.S.A.
Elevated ground-level ozone associated with climate change and the rapidly evolving rust races are major challenges to wheat production worldwide. Because of higher susceptibility, rust universal-susceptible varieties are used as susceptible hosts to maintain and increase inoculum for most of the rust races. These varieties could also be used to study the interactive effects of ozone on different rust races. A first step is to assess the O3 responses of these wheat varieties. In this research, we screened the wheat lines Chinese Spring, CSA, Line E, Little Club, LMPG-6, McNair 701, Morocco, Rusty and Thatcher for O3 tolerance at four O3 concentrations. Results showed that Thatcher is the most sensitive and Chinese Spring is the most tolerant among the nine lines tested. For future studies of the effects of ozone on different stem rust races, LMPG-6, Rusty and McNair 701 could be used as O3-sensitive if compared to the more ozone-tolerant CSA or Chinese Spring. Similarly, Thatcher is a suitable O3-sensitive line that could be used with either Little Club or Morocco for studying O3 effects on different races of leaf rust. Identification of lines having differential ozone response will enable further genetic studies on ozone tolerance.