Correspondence to: grenie19@myumanitoba.ca

Lodging, which refers to the permanent displacement of plants from their upright positions, is one of the major constraints to spring wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) production since it negatively impacts harvest efficiency, and grain yield and quality. Lodging is a quantitative trait regulated by many genes that interact with environmental factors. The main genetic approach deployed to mitigate the negative effects of lodging involves the use of semi-dwarfing genes, which may limit the yield potential of modern cultivars through decreasing photosynthetic areas.

Therefore, there is a need to identify alternate genetic components which contribute to lodging resistance without affecting photosynthesis potential of the plant. To this end, this study conducted a genome-wide association study of a diverse association mapping panel consisting of 181 spring wheat genotypes in multiple environments.

The mapping panel was phenotyped for lodging-related culm traits, including the breaking strength of the second basal internode, bending moment, and lodging index. The panel was also genotyped using the 90K iSelect BeadChip Array, resulting in a filtered set of 18,611 single nucleotide polymorphism markers used to determine their association with the lodging-related traits examined in this study.

Our analysis identified multiple quantitative trait loci associated with breaking strength, bending moment, and lodging index traits across all trial environments. The findings of this study may have potential use in marker-assisted selection for lodging resistance in spring wheat.