Research Projects

India, the largest producer of chickpea, faces challenges in increasing its productivity due to various biotic and abiotic factors. Fungal pathogens and pest infestations are major biotic limitations in chickpea production. The fusarium wilt (FW) disease, caused by different races of the fungal pathogen Fusarium oxysporum f.sp. ciceris (Foc), has been introduced through traditional breeding, reducing diversity on chickpea chromosome 2. The marker-based selection in molecular breeding against FW has been unsuccessful due to a lack of knowledge regarding race-specific resistance genes and their associated markers. To overcome traditional shortcomings, a new approach has been proposed: developing transcriptomes from available bi-parental cross-derived FW differential lines, comparing chromosome 2 coding region polymorphism in differential lines, developing novel polymorphic functional markers, and checking the presence/absence of these markers within these bi-parental differential lines. This comparative approach will help associate polymorphisms with race-specific resistance genes that are functional against fusarium wilt disease. The developed markers will help in molecular breeding of FW resistance in Indian farmers adapted mega-varieties of chickpea. In conclusion, the proposed work aims to identify race-specific resistance genes of chickpea that provide field-level resistance against FW and develop markers for molecular breeding against FW resistance in Indian farmers.