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| Genome-wide Association Analysis of Wheat (Triticum aestivum) Flour Pasting Properties and Candidate Gene Prediction |
| ZHENG Jie-Xin1, LI Bo2, ZHOU Bin1, RAN Hao-Jiang1, JIA Yao1, GONG Jin-Peng1, XU Fei-Xue1, XU Le1,*, XU Yan-Hao2,* |
1 College of Agriculture/MARA Key Laboratory of Sustainable Crop Production in the Middle Reaches of the Yangtze River (Co-construction by Ministry and Province)/Hubei Key Laboratory of Waterlogging Disaster and Agricultural Use of Wetland, Yangtze University, Jingzhou 434025, China;
2 Institute of Food Crops/Hubei Key Laboratory of Food Crop Germplasm and Genetic Improvement/Key Laboratory of Crop Molecular Breeding, Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, Hubei Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Wuhan 430064, China |
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Abstract Wheat flour pasting properties are important indicators of processing quality. To dissect the genetic basis of these traits, in this study, 221 wheat (Triticum aestivum) accessions were evaluated for 7 wheat flour pasting traits, including peak viscosity, trough viscosity, breakdown, final viscosity, setback, peak time, and pasting temperature, across 4 environments over 3 years. Using 90K SNP array data, a genome-wide association study (GWAS) was conducted with 5 models, namely the general linear model (GLM), mixed linear model (MLM), multi-locus mixed linear model (MLMM), fixed and random model circulating probability unification (FarmCPU), and bayesian-information and linkage-disequilibrium iteratively nested keyway (BLINK). All 7 traits showed abundant phenotypic variation, with coefficients of variation ranging from 0.92% to 33.02% and broad-sense heritability ranging from 40.31% to 70.36%. Joint GWAS analysis across multiple models identified 8 significant and stable association loci on chromosomes 2B, 5A, 6B, and 7A, each explaining 2.09% to 9.26% of the phenotypic variation. Haplotype analysis further identified the superior haplotypes of these high-confidence loci and their distribution frequencies in the population. Candidate genes were screened within the 200 kb regions upstream and downstream of the high-confidence loci. Combined with gene expression analysis, 2 candidate genes related to wheat flour pasting properties were identified, namely TraesCS6B03G0474900 (encoding a glycine cleavage system H family protein) and TraesCS2B03G0671500 (encoding a 40S ribosomal protein S12). This study provides a reference for the genetic dissection and molecular breeding of wheat flour quality.
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Received: 02 February 2026
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Corresponding Authors:
*xule@yangtzeu.edu.cn; xyh@hbaas.com
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