Soybean Research

AAFC soybean breeding and research for aphid disease resistance and for enhanced soy utilization
Dr. Vaino Poysa and Dr. Elroy Cober, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada

The AAFC soybean breeding program in Ottawa and Harrow made good progress over the last three years in developing high quality, pest resistant food grade soybeans and improving short and ultra-short season soybeans. The AAFC breeding program collaborated closely with the University of Guelph/ OMAFRA program to increase the effectiveness and efficiency of public resources.

One focus of our breeding program has been genetic control of the recently introduced soybean aphid (SBA) and the potentially devastating soybean leaf rust (SLR).

For SBA we have used several unadapted sources of resistance identified in the US, including lines with the Rag1 gene for SBA resistance from University of Illinois; the Rag2 gene from Ohio State University (OSU); and several lines from China identified at Michigan State University (MSU). Unfortunately, field data from Harrow, Michigan, and Ohio over several years has shown that SBA biotypes in the Lake Erie basin are not effectively controlled by Rag1 resistance, while Harrow data in 2008 showed that these aphids are not controlled by Rag2 either. Two of the MSU sources have shown good control in the field.

We will use DNA markers linked to Rag1 and Rag2 to combine these with the MSU sources in adapted lines, hoping that the combination of resistances will prove more durable. Fortunately, the aphid population in Ottawa is controlled by Rag1. However, the rapidity with which the SBA resistances have been overcome, even without selection pressure for resistant biotypes, suggests this could be a very difficult pest to control through genetic resistance.

For SLR, we have developed 5th and 6th generation lines which have been resistant to SLR in Florida trials over two years. These have been distributed to other breeders and will be used to develop adapted lines. This will become a minor objective as we do not anticipate that SLR will be able to reach Canada each season in time to seriously impact yield or quality of Canadian soybeans.

Over the course of this three year project, AAFC released 15 food grade soybeans under the RFP process for licensing. To date eight of these cultivars (five tofu, two natto, and one high protein) have been commercialized by companies in Manitoba, Ontario, and Quebec. In February 2009 two lines from Harrow, which were the two top yielding lines in the 3400 Ontario Soybean Variety conventional trials, and one line from Eastern Cereal and Oilseed Research Centre from the 2600 trials, were offered for licensing.