Quantitative trait loci associated with functional stay-green SNU-SG1 in rice

During monocarpic senescence in higher plants, functional stay-green delays leaf yellowing, maintaining photosynthetic competence, whereas nonfunctional stay-green retains leaf greenness without sustaining photosynthetic activity. Thus, functional stay-green is considered a beneficial trait that can increase grain yield in cereal crops. A stay-green japonica rice 'SNU-SG1' had a good seed-setting rate and grain yield, indicating the presence of a functional stay-green genotype. SNU-SG1 was crossed with two regular cultivars to determine the inheritance mode and identify major QTLs conferring stay-green in SNU-SG1. For QTL analysis, linkage maps with 100 and 116 DNA marker loci were constructed using selective genotyping with F2 and RIL (recombinant inbred line) populations, respectively. Molecular marker-based QTL analyses with both populations revealed that the functional stay-green phenotype of SNU-SG1 is regulated by several major QTLs accounting for a large portion of the genetic variation. Three main-effect QTLs located on chromosomes 7 and 9 were detected in both populations and a number of epistatic-effect QTLs were also found. The amount of variation explained by several digenic interactions was larger than that explained by main-effect QTLs. Two main-effect QTLs on chromosome 9 can be considered the target loci that most influence the functional stay-green in SNU-SG1. The functional stay-green QTLs may help develop low-input high-yielding rice cultivars by QTL-marker-assisted breeding with SNU-SG1.