AUTHOR=Zuo Zhihao , Lu Yue , Zhu Minyan , Chen Rujia , Zhang Enying , Hao Derong , Huang Qianfeng , Wang Hanyao , Su Yanze , Wang Zhichao , Xu Yang , Li Pengcheng , Xu Chenwu , Yang Zefeng 

TITLE=Nucleotide Diversity of the Maize ZmCNR13 Gene and Association With Ear Traits

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Genetics

VOLUME=12

YEAR=2021

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/genetics/articles/10.3389/fgene.2021.773597

DOI=10.3389/fgene.2021.773597

ISSN=1664-8021

ABSTRACT=<p>The maize (<italic>Zea mays</italic> L<italic>.</italic>) <italic>ZmCNR13</italic> gene, encoding a protein of <italic>fw2.2-like</italic> (<italic>FWL</italic>) family, has been demonstrated to be involved in cell division, expansion, and differentiation. In the present study, the genomic sequences of the <italic>ZmCNR13</italic> locus were re-sequenced in 224 inbred lines, 56 landraces and 30 teosintes, and the nucleotide polymorphism and selection signature were estimated. A total of 501 variants, including 415 SNPs and 86 Indels, were detected. Among them, 51 SNPs and 4 Indels were located in the coding regions. Although neutrality tests revealed that this locus had escaped from artificial selection during the process of maize domestication, the population of inbred lines possesses lower nucleotide diversity and decay of linkage disequilibrium. To estimate the association between sequence variants of <italic>ZmCNR13</italic> and maize ear characteristics, a total of ten ear-related traits were obtained from the selected inbred lines. Four variants were found to be significantly associated with six ear-related traits. Among them, SNP2305, a non-synonymous mutation in exon 2, was found to be associated with ear weight, ear grain weight, ear diameter and ear row number, and explained 4.59, 4.61, 4.31, and 8.42% of the phenotypic variations, respectively. These results revealed that natural variations of <italic>ZmCNR13</italic> might be involved in ear development and can be used in genetic improvement of maize ear-related traits.</p>