Identifying genes and their polymorphism for battling viral diseases

This proposal addresses agriculturally relevant and fundamental concepts of virus diseases, with the major aim to identify means to achieve broad-spectrum virus resistance for high-value crop protection strategies. To this end, our main approach will be a unique combination of diverse viruses with plant genetic variation.

Firstly, we take a focus on how virus disease is impacted by genetic variation in the Arabidopsis model and its close relative turnip rape, in part for an interspecies evaluation but also to evaluate how feasible such a strategy is in crop protection.

Secondly, by using wide genetic diversity we enable genome-wide association studies (GWAS) to uncover plant genes regulating virus disease phenotypes, including plant resilience and virus resistance.

The possibility to combine virus diversity with high-resolution GWAS presents unique forward genetic opportunities that recently became available via genome resource developments.

We plan to use both the Arabidopsis model and turnip rape crop for GWAS with different viruses to identify broad-spectrum resistance and tolerance genes, and the parallel combination of the two plant models results in a multispecies comparative understanding of the dependence between viruses and plant genetic backgrounds in shaping disease.

Furthemore, this enables virus resistance breeding in turnip rape. Taken together, this research forms cutting-edge virology designed towards agricultural high-value outcomes.