Summary
Flowering time is a critical determinant of the geographic distribution and regional adaptability of soybean (
Glycine max
) and is strongly regulated by photoperiod and temperature. In this study, quantitative trait locus (QTL) mapping and subsequent candidate gene analysis revealed that
GmPRR37
, encoding a pseudo‐response regulator protein, is responsible for the major QTL
qFT12‐2
, which was identified from a population of 308 recombinant inbred lines (RILs) derived from a cross between a very late‐flowering soybean cultivar, ‘Zigongdongdou (ZGDD)’, and an extremely early‐flowering cultivar, ‘Heihe27 (HH27)’, in multiple environments. Comparative analysis of parental sequencing data confirmed that HH27 contains a non‐sense mutation that causes the loss of the CCT domain in the GmPRR37 protein. CRISPR/Cas9‐induced
Gmprr37
‐ZGDD mutants in soybean exhibited early flowering under natural long‐day (NLD) conditions. Overexpression of
GmPRR37
significantly delayed the flowering of transgenic soybean plants compared with wild‐type under long photoperiod conditions. In addition, both the knockout and overexpression of
GmPRR37
in soybean showed no significant phenotypic alterations in flowering time under short‐day (SD) conditions. Furthermore,
GmPRR37
down‐regulated the expression of the flowering‐promoting
FT
homologues
GmFT2a
and
GmFT5a
, and up‐regulated flowering‐inhibiting
FT
homologue
GmFT1a
expression under long‐day (LD) conditions. We analysed haplotypes of
GmPRR37
among 180 cultivars collected across China and found natural
Gmprr37
mutants flower earlier and enable soybean to be cultivated at higher latitudes. This study demonstrates that
GmPRR37
controls soybean photoperiodic flowering and provides opportunities to breed optimized cultivars with adaptation to specific regions and farming systems.
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