Disease Resistance in Chickpea - Translational Genomics for Crop Breeding: Biotic Stress - page 201

Chapter 11

Disease Resistance in Chickpea

TeresaMillan,EvaMadrid,MuhammadImtiaz,MohamedKharrat,and WeidongChen

Abstract

Chickpea is a grain legume with valuable nutritional characteristics; it is a basic aliment in Asian
countries such as India and Pakistan as well as a traditional ingredient in Mediterranean diets. Biotic
stresses such as ascochyta blight and fusarium wilt, together with other diseases, such as botrytis gray
mold and rust, are major constraints on stable chickpea production. Marker-assisted selection (MAS) is
a tool that is significantly augmenting the efficacy and efficiency of chickpea breeding programs. This
chapter reviews the current status and future potential of genomic tools for chickpea breeding aimed
at countering biotic stresses. It also provides an overview of causal agents, host resistance inheritance,
gene or quantitative trait locus (QTL) mapping, genetic resources, and progress in introgression of
resistance genes to cultivated chickpea as well as integrated disease management.

10.5 M tonnes (FAOSTAT 2011). On the basis
of seed type, chickpea has been divided into two
groups: pink to purple flowers and dark angular
seeds are characteristics of the Desi type, while
white flowers and large beige to white colored
seeds mark the Kabuli type. These types differ
also in agronomic traits such as growth habit and
resistance/tolerance to biotic and abiotic stresses.
Compared to other legumes, chickpea is more
tolerant to heat and drought, and it is consid-
ered an important low-input crop in cropping
systems of arid and semi-arid regions around
the world (Saxena 1987). Even though world
chickpea yield has improved during the past
decades (world average 905 kg/ha in 2009, FAO-
STAT 2011) there are still major production con-
straints to overcome, particularly under current
changing climatic conditions.

Introduction

Chickpea ( Cicer arietinum L.) is the only cul-
tivated species within the genus Cicer .Itisa
self-pollinated, annual diploid (2n 16)

with a relatively small genome size (740 Mbp,
Arumuganathan and Earle 1991). It is included
in the tribe Cicereae within the Galegoid clade
together with the tribes Viceae and Trifolieae
(Choi et al. 2004). The accepted wild progenitor
of chickpea ( Cicer reticulatum Ladz.) was dis-
covered and collected in an area of southeastern
Turkey (Ladizinsky and Adler 1976).
This grain legume is used mainly for human
consumption and is cultivated all over the world.
India is the main producer, followed by Turkey
and Pakistan, which contribute 67.5%, 7%, and
5%, respectively, of the total world production of

= 2x =