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Teosinte, an ancestor to modern maize, displays an excellent performance regarding resistance to stress, but its yield potential has rarely been reported. To evaluate the potential contribution of teosinte to maize improvement, two maize–teosinte backcrossed recombination inbred line (RIL) populations and their corresponding test‐cross hybrids were planted for trait assessment. In RN and ZP RIL populations, the average coefficients of variation of 31 agronomic traits were 9.14% (Range, 0.38%‒25.21%) and 6.85% (Range, 0.55%‒27.73%), respectively. The correlation coefficients of 13 common shared traits between RIL populations and test‐cross hybrid populations ranged from 0.10 to 0.60 and from 0.06 to 0.72, respectively. A total of 39 and 3 recombined inbred lines, and 29 and 47 test‐cross hybrids exhibited higher yields than their checks (RP125, Zheng58, CD189 and ZD958) with the BLUP data, respectively. Furthermore, four test‐cross hybrids including RN034/SCML1950, ZP068/Chang7‐2, ZP079/Chang7‐2 and ZP122/Chang7‐2 showed a more stable yield performance, with yield gains of +7.07%, +3.64%, +5.83% and +3.82% over checks, respectively. In conclusion, teosinte could serve as an alien germplasm for maize breeding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To develop genetic markers associated with tolerance to low phosphorus, we identified candidate phosphate starvation responsive ( PSR) genes and developed their intron length polymorphism ( ILP) markers in maize on a genome-wide scale. Based on the known plant PSR genes, 161 candidate PSR genes were identified. Of these genes, 138 genes contained at least one intron and were then used to develop 606 PSR- ILP markers by designing PCR primers to the intron-flanking exonic regions. PCR evaluation was performed on 43 randomly selected PSR- ILP markers in 30 maize inbred lines. Of the primers, 88.4% amplified stable and pure products in all maize inbred lines, and 53.5% of the markers showed ILP, with PIC values ranging from 0.06 to 0.80. The result of clustering analysis of the 30 maize inbred lines, based on the polymorphism of 23 ILP markers, suggests that the ILP markers developed in this study are not only efficient for genetic diversity analysis but also potentially useful for marker assisted selection for tolerance to low phosphorus. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Large-scale selective genotyping and high-throughput analysis are two important strategies for low-cost and high-effective genetic mapping. In this study, selective genotyping was applied to four maize F2 populations. Thirty plants were selected from each of the two tails of the original F2 populations to represent extreme resistant and susceptible plants to root lodging, and genotyped individually with 1536 single nucleotide polymorphisms ( SNPs). A quantitative trait locus ( QTL) was declared when at least three closely linked SNPs showed significant allele frequency difference between the two tails. Nine QTL were identified for root lodging across the four populations, which were located on chromosomes 2, 4, 5, 7, 8 and 10 and one of them was shared between two populations. A total of 20 segregation distortion regions ( SDRs) were identified across the four populations, one of which was co-localized with a QTL on chromosome 4. The tightly linked SNPs identified in this study can be used for marker-assisted selection for root lodging. Selective genotyping, when combined with pooled DNA analysis, can be used to develop strategies for high-throughput genetic mapping for all crops. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]