Resistance to Fusarium Head Blight in Some Syrian Wheat and Barley Cultivars
Resistance to Fusarium Head Blight in Some Syrian Wheat and Barley Cultivars
Nachaat Sakr
ABSTRACT
Fusarium head blight (FHB) can have a destructive effect of barley and wheat along the whole world. To defeat it, sources of host resistance and pathogenic variation of FHB species need to be identified. Although barley and wheat are crucial crops in the dried Mediterranean area, there is insufficient information about their resistance to head blight infection and aggressiveness of Fusarium species. A 3-year (2019 to 2021) experiment was conducted under arid Mediterranean conditions to measure disease reactions, i.e., FHB incidence (DI, Type I resistance), FHB severity (DS, Type II) and FHB-damaged kernels (FDK, Type III), on barley, bread and durum wheat cultivars of varying susceptibility to four species of FHB. Although there were no marked differences in disease levels over the 3 years, a wide range of resistance was expressed by adult Type I and Type II to head blight among a group of eight cereal cultivars, indicating that host plays an important role in distinguishing head blight susceptibility. The differences of DI and DS among the cultivars tested with 16 FHB isolates revealed that the variation in pathogenicity among the FHB population is crucial for developing disease-resistant cultivars. FDK component did not differentiate the eight analyzed cereal genotypes and pathogen strains. Most significantly, stability of cultivars for head blight resistance was fulfilled during seasons as well as under several experimental conditions, suggesting that cultivars with stable and high disease resistance could be incorporated to crossbreeding programs to reinforce host resistance to fungal infection. This primarily study has recognized some favorable barley and wheat cultivars for selected breeding and commercialization aims in the arid Mediterranean area; Bohoth 10 (bread wheat) and Arabi Aswad (barley) ranking among the most head blight resistant cereal cultivars.
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