Back to the wild: mining maize (Zea mays L.) disease resistance using advanced breeding tools

Cultivated modern maize (Zea mays L.) originated through the continuous process of domestication from its wild progenitors. Today, maize is considered as the most important cereal crop which is extensively cultivated in all parts of the world. Maize shows remarkable genotypic and phenotypic diversity which makes it an ideal model species for crop genetic research. However, intensive breeding and artificial selection of desired agronomic traits greatly narrow down the genetic bases of maize. This reduction in genetic diversity among cultivated maize led to increase the chance of more attack of biotic stress as climate changes hampering the maize grain production globally. Maize germplasm requires to integrate both durable multiple-diseases and multiple insect-pathogen resistance through tapping the unexplored resources of maize landraces. Revisiting the landraces seed banks will provide effective opportunities to transfer the resistant genes into the modern cultivars. Here, we describe the maize domestication process and discuss the unique genes from wild progenitors which potentially can be utilized for disease resistant in maize. We also focus on the genetics and disease resistance mechanism of various genes against maize biotic stresses and then considered the different molecular breeding tools for gene transfer and advanced high resolution mapping for gene pyramiding in maize lines. At last, we provide an insight for targeting identified key genes through CRISPR/Cas9 genome editing system to enhance the maize resilience towards biotic stress.