Recent advances in faba bean genetic and genomic tools for crop improvement

Abstract

Faba bean (Vicia faba L.), a member of the Fabaceae family, is one of the important food legumes cultivated in cool temperate regions. It holds great importance for human consumption and livestock feed because of its high protein content, dietary fibre, and nutritional value. Major faba bean breeding challenges include its mixed breeding system, unknown wild progenitor, and genome size of ~13 Gb, which is the largest among diploid field crops. The key breeding objectives in faba bean include improved resistance to biotic and abiotic stress and enhanced seed quality traits. Regarding quality traits, major progress on reduction of vicine‐convicine and seed coat tannins, the main anti‐nutritional factors limiting faba bean seed usage, have been recently achieved through gene discovery. Genomic resources are relatively less advanced compared with other grain legume species, but significant improvements are underway due to a recent increase in research activities. A number of bi‐parental populations have been constructed and mapped for targeted traits in the last decade. Faba bean now benefits from saturated synteny‐based genetic maps, along with next‐generation sequencing and high‐throughput genotyping technologies that are paving the way for marker‐assisted selection. Developing a reference genome, and ultimately a pan‐genome, will provide a foundational resource for molecular breeding. In this review, we cover the recent development and deployment of genomic tools for faba bean breeding.

Conventional and Molecular Breeding Tools for Accelerating Genetic Gain in Faba Bean (Vicia Faba L.)

“…Furthermore, closely linked DNA markers have been reported for host plant resistance to ascochyta blight (Avila et al, 2004;Kaur et al, 2014;Atienza et al, 2016;Sudheesh et al, 2019;Faridi et al, 2021), however, their verification and availability in breeder friendly format is yet to come. Detailed information on available QTLs and DNA markers for adapting to biotic and abiotic stresses in faba bean was recently reviewed by Khazaei et al (2021). Faba bean breeding efforts would benefit greatly from development of effective DNA markers for improving resistance to chocolate spot.…”

“…In the absence of a reference genome assembly for faba bean, high-density genetic maps and high-throughput approaches such as transcriptome analysis have been used for enrichment of genomic resources (Khazaei et al, 2021). At the writing of this article various cooperative reference genome assembly efforts are concurrently underway.…”

“…Genomic selection based on prediction of breeding values, as a natural extension of MAS, may become available for faba bean as more high throughput dense markers and DNA data sets come available. A recent review by Khazaei et al (2021) documents the current availability of genomic resources for faba bean. Liu et al (2019) reported that the efficiency of genomic selection was markedly higher than phenotypic selection and the efficiency would increase further if genomic selection was accompanied by speed breeding.…”

Genetic Variability of Tunisian Faba Beans (Vicia faba L.) Based on Seeds’ Morphophysical Properties as Assessed by Statistical Analysis

“…e variety carrying the VC-gene is of interest for monogastric feeding and as food for human deficient G 6 PD enzyme allowing the avoidance of metabolic disease called favism [25]. Although faba bean seeds harbor several nutritional benefits, their consumption is restricted and limited by the vicine and convicine compounds that are responsible for favism disease [26][27][28]. erefore, discovering a morphological trait associated with low VC phenotype would be an easy and simple marker for farmers, but also a considerable gain of time and energy in breeding programs for detecting low/free CV faba bean phenotypes [26][27][28].…”

Mining and predictive characterization of resistance to leaf rust (Puccinia hordei Otth) using two subsets of barley genetic resources

“…When the relationship is confirmed, a manageable subset can be selected to include accessions with high probability of having the sought trait. FIGS subsets have allowed to identify for the first-time sources of resistance to Sunn pest in wheat (El Bouhssini et al 2009), resistance to net blotch in barley (Endersen et al 2011), and drought tolerance in faba bean (Khazaei et al 2021).…”