Cowpea (Vigna unguiculata): Genetics, genomics and breeding

Abstract

Cowpea, Vigna unguiculata (L.), is an important grain legume grown in the tropics where it constitutes a valuable source of protein in the diets of millions of people. Some abiotic and biotic stresses adversely affect its productivity. A review of the genetics, genomics and breeding of cowpea is presented in this article. Cowpea breeding programmes have studied intensively qualitative and quantitative genetics of the crop to better enhance its improvement. A number of initiatives including Tropical Legumes projects have contributed to the development of cowpea genomic resources. Recent progress in the development of consensus genetic map containing 37,372 SNPs mapped to 3,280 bins will strengthen cowpea trait discovery pipeline. Several informative markers associated with quantitative trait loci (QTL) related to desirable attributes of cowpea were generated. Cowpea genetic improvement activities aim at the development of drought tolerant, phosphorus use efficient, bacterial blight and virus resistant lines through exploiting available genetic resources as well as deployment of modern breeding tools that will enhance genetic gain when grown by sub-Saharan Africa farmers.

The genome of cowpea (Vigna unguiculata [L.] Walp.)

“…Cowpea was domesticated in Africa (Faris, ; D'Andrea et al ., ), from where it spread into all continents and now is commonly grown in many parts of Asia , Europe, USA, and Central and South America. One of the strengths of cowpea is its high resilience to harsh conditions, including hot and dry environments, and poor soils (Boukar et al ., ). Still, as sub‐Saharan Africa and other cowpea production regions encounter climate variability (Kotir, ; Serdeczny et al ., ), breeding for more climate‐resilient varieties remains a priority.…”

Epistasis detection and modeling for genomic selection in cowpea (Vigna unguiculata. L. Walp.)

“…However, in orphan crop species, applications of 88 genomic-enabled breeding (GEB) methods is still limited (Varshney et al, 2012). 89Cowpea (Vigna unguiculata L. Walp) is a widely adapted warm-season orphan 90 herbaceous leguminous annual crop and an important source of protein in developing 91 countries (Muchero et al, 2009;Varshney et al, 2012;Boukar et al, 2018; Huynh et al, 92 2018). Cowpea is cultivated over 12.5 million hectares in tropical and sub-tropical zones of 93 the world including Sub-Saharan Africa, Asia, South America, Central America, the 94 Caribbean, United States of America and around the Mediterranean Sea.…”

“…Due to its flexibility as a "hungry season crop" 98 (Langyintuo et al, 2003), cowpea is part of the rural families' coping strategies to mitigate 99 the effect of changing climatic conditions. 100Cowpea's nitrogen fixing and drought tolerance capabilities make it a valuable crop 101 for low-input and smallholder farming systems (Hall et al, 2003;Boukar et al, 2018). 102Breeding efforts using classical approaches have been made to improve cowpea's tolerance 103 to both biotic (disease and pest) and abiotic (drought and heat) stressors (Hall et al, 2003; 104 Hall, 2004).…”

“…Cowpea's nitrogen fixing and drought tolerance capabilities make it a valuable crop 101 for low-input and smallholder farming systems (Hall et al, 2003;Boukar et al, 2018). 102…”

Understanding patterns of abiotic and biotic stress resilience to unleash the potential of crop wild relatives for climate-smart legume breeding

“…The Vigna ex situ conservation status was determined with data from the 2017 WIEWS database 9 and the online platform Genesys 10 . Breeding objectives were defined on the basis of two key breeding papers of the two most important Vigna crops: mung bean and cowpea 11,12 . These objectives were revised and completed by the coordinator of the International Mungbean Improvement Network (pers.…”