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Whole-genome resequencing of 292 pigeonpea accessions identifies genomic regions associated with domestication and agronomic traits

Nature Genetics volume 49, pages 1082–1088 (2017)Cite this article

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Abstract

Pigeonpea (Cajanus cajan), a tropical grain legume with low input requirements, is expected to continue to have an important role in supplying food and nutritional security in developing countries in Asia, Africa and the tropical Americas. From whole-genome resequencing of 292 Cajanus accessions encompassing breeding lines, landraces and wild species, we characterize genome-wide variation. On the basis of a scan for selective sweeps, we find several genomic regions that were likely targets of domestication and breeding. Using genome-wide association analysis, we identify associations between several candidate genes and agronomically important traits. Candidate genes for these traits in pigeonpea have sequence similarity to genes functionally characterized in other plants for flowering time control, seed development and pod dehiscence. Our findings will allow acceleration of genetic gains for key traits to improve yield and sustainability in pigeonpea.

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Figure 1: An overview on diversity in 292 Cajanus accessions.
Figure 2: A Circos image representing variations identified across 292 Cajanus accessions.
Figure 3: Significant marker–trait associations for 100-seed weight, days to 50% flowering and plant height.

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Acknowledgements

The authors are thankful to the US Agency for International Development (USAID) for providing financial support to R.K.V. The authors would like to thank A. Gafoor, B. Poornima and P. Bajaj for their support in this work. This work has been undertaken as part of the CGIAR Research Program on Grain Legumes. ICRISAT is a member of the CGIAR Consortium.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), Hyderabad, India

    Rajeev K Varshney, Rachit K Saxena, Hari D Upadhyaya, Aamir W Khan, Abhishek Rathore & Vinay Kumar

  2. School of Agriculture and Environment and Institute of Agriculture, University of Western Australia, Crawley, Western Australia, Australia

    Rajeev K Varshney

  3. Shenzhen Millennium Genomics, Inc., Shenzhen, China

    Yue Yu, Shaun An & Wei Zhang

  4. MACROGEN, Inc., Seoul, Republic of Korea

    Changhoon Kim, Dongseon Kim, Jihun Kim & Jong-So Kim

  5. Institute of Biotechnology, Professor Jayshankar Telangana State Agricultural University (PJTSAU), Hyderabad, India

    Ghanta Anuradha & Kalinati Narasimhan Yamini

  6. Agricultural Research Station (ARS)–Gulbarga, University of Agricultural Sciences (UAS), Karnataka, India

    Sonnappa Muniswamy

  7. Department of Plant Sciences, University of California–Davis, Davis, California, USA

    R Varma Penmetsa

  8. Biological Sciences and International Center for Tropical Botany, Florida International University, Miami, Florida, USA

    Eric von Wettberg

  9. Visva-Bharati, Shantiniketan, India

    Swapan K Datta

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  1. Rajeev K Varshney
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  2. Rachit K Saxena
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Contributions

R.K.V., R.K.S., Y.Y., C.K., D.K., J.K., S.A., V.K., J.-S.K. and W.Z. contributed to generation of whole-genome resequencing data. H.D.U. and R.K.V. contributed genetic material. H.D.U., G.A., K.N.Y. and S.M. performed phenotyping. R.K.V., R.K.S., H.D.U., A.W.K., C.K., A.R., D.K., J.K., S.A., J.-S.K., R.V.P., E.v.W. and S.K.D. worked on different analyses. R.K.V. and R.K.S. together with C.K., A.R., J.-S.K., R.V.P. and E.v.W. wrote and finalized the manuscript. R.K.V. and R.K.S. directed the project, and R.K.V. conceived and designed the study.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Rajeev K Varshney.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Text and Figures

Supplementary Figures 1–12, Supplementary Tables 10–12 and 17, and Supplementary Note (PDF 16895 kb)

Supplementary Table 1

Details on 300 Cajanus accessions (breeding lines, landraces and wild species accessions) including biological status, species, geographical region, country and state. (XLSX 20 kb)

Supplementary Table 2

Details on raw sequencing data generated on 292 Cajanus accessions. (XLSX 30 kb)

Supplementary Table 3

Identification and distribution of molecular variation (SNPs and indels) among 11 pseudomolecules CcLG01 to CcLG11 and unanchored genome sequence as CcLG0. (XLSX 21 kb)

Supplementary Table 4

Nonsynonymous-to-synonymous ratio in breeding lines, landraces and wild species in 1-Mb non-overlapping windows. (XLSX 17 kb)

Supplementary Table 5

Non-synonymous to synonymous ratio in breeding lines, landraces and wild species in 10 Kb non-overlapping windows (XLSX 1172 kb)

Supplementary Table 6

19 genomic regions (R1 to R19) showing high (>2.5) nonsynonymous-to-synonymous ratio in breeding lines, landraces and wild species in 1-Mb non-overlapping windows. (XLS 1068 kb)

Supplementary Table 7

Structural variations (CNVs and PAVs) identified in breeding lines as compared to the reference genome. (XLSX 29 kb)

Supplementary Table 8

Structural variations (CNVs and PAVs) identified in landraces as compared to the reference genome. (XLSX 24 kb)

Supplementary Table 9

Structural variations (CNVs and PAVs) identified in wild species accessions as compared to the reference genome. (XLSX 24 kb)

Supplementary Table 13

ROD values calculated during domestication (wild species versus landraces) and breeding (landraces versus breeding lines) at 10-kb non-overlapping windows. (XLSX 582 kb)

Supplementary Table 14

FST values for ROD regions with maximum values calculated in a pairwise manner for landraces versus breeding lines and wild species versus landraces. (XLSX 119 kb)

Supplementary Table 15

Genes that played an important role in domestication of crop species and their homologs in Cajanus. (XLSX 23 kb)

Supplementary Table 16

Trait phenotyping data used for GWAS. (XLSX 59 kb)

Supplementary Table 18

MTAs identified for target traits with P values. (XLSX 43 kb)

Supplementary Table 19

Number of favorable alleles identified in Cajanus accessions for detected MTAs in each trait. (XLSX 31 kb)

Supplementary Table 20

The distribution of favorable alleles for 17 MTAs detected for 100-seed weight in Cajanus accessions. (XLSX 25 kb)

Supplementary Table 21

MTAs identified in GWAS for different target traits and their corresponding structural variations (CNVs and PAVs) in breeding lines, landraces and wild species accessions. (XLSX 61 kb)

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Varshney, R., Saxena, R., Upadhyaya, H. et al. Whole-genome resequencing of 292 pigeonpea accessions identifies genomic regions associated with domestication and agronomic traits. Nat Genet 49, 1082–1088 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/ng.3872

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