To clarify the effects of high- and low-ridge planting patterns on wheat in the Yellow River Delta Region, the effects of high- and low-ridge planting mode on wheat plant height component index, leaf area index, yield and yield component factors, grain quality and other indicators were studied from 2021 to 2023, using wheat varieties Jimai 22 and Hengguan 35 as materials. The small ridge planting mode was used as control. The results showed that compared with the control, the plant height of wheat planted in high-ridge significantly decreased, while the peduncle and plant height index significantly increased. The plant height of wheat planted in low-ridge significantly increased, while the peduncle and plant height index significantly decreased. The leaf area and leaf area index of wheat in high- and low-ridge increased, while the functional leaf area index decreased. The number of spikes was increased by 11.15% to 20.26%, and the yield was increased by 9.73% to 14.15%. Wheat in high-ridge had more effective spikes than that in low-ridge did, contributing 41.18% of the yield with one-third of the planting area. In terms of wheat grain quality, there were no significant differences in protein content, wet gluten content, stability time, extensibility, and stretching area between high- and low-ridge wheat and the control. In summary, high- and low-ridge planting can significantly increase wheat yield, but has no significant impact on grain quality traits. High-ridge wheat has a higher population size and a greater contribution to yield compared to low-ridge wheat. High- and low-ridge planting can be used as a high-yield wheat planting mode in the Yellow River Delta Region.

Two-line hybrid wheat is currently the main type of hybrid wheat in China. To analyze the genetic diversity and relationships between the parental lines of the two-line hybrid wheat, this study used the wheat 90K SNP (single nucleotide polymorphism) array to conduct a genome-wide screening of 123 parental lines of two-line hybrid wheat, and to estimate the genetic distance between lines and reveal their genetic diversity. The results showed that the polymorphism rate of SNP loci on the 21 wheat chromosomes reached up to 82.40%. The distribution of polymorphic loci on each chromosome ranged from 895 to 6 165, and the distribution of polymorphic markers among sub-genomes ranked as B>A>D, with the number of polymorphic markers distributed in 7 homoeologous groups in the order of 5>3>1>2>7>6>4. The genetic distance between the 123 hybrid wheat parental lines ranged from 0.001 to 0.513, with an average of 0.369. Among them, the genetic distance of the 60 male sterile lines ranged from 0.001 to 0.499, with an average of 0.324; the genetic distance of the 63 restorer lines ranged from 0.002 to 0.513, with an average of 0.372; and the genetic distance between the 60 male sterile lines with the 63 restorer lines ranged from 0.225 to 0.511, with an average of 0.387. The clustering results showed that all materials were divided into four different clusters. Integrated analysis of SNP and material types showed that the genetic distance between male sterile lines and restorer lines was the largest, followed by the difference between restorer lines, while the difference between male sterile lines was the smallest. Based on the analysis of genetic distance and relationships, it was found that the genetic differences among the two-line hybrid wheat parents are generally small, with some parents showing inbreeding tendencies. It is necessary to broaden the genetic background and increase the genetic diversity of the parents to improve the breeding level of hybrid wheat.

The known wheat leaf resistance gene Lr3ka is a seedling resistance gene exhibiting high levels of resistance in China with important application potentiality. In this study, to know more information of Lr3ka, leaf rust pathotype FHJR was used to inoculate RL6007(carrying Lr3ka), Thatcher and F₂ populations to identify the leaf rust resistance at seedling stage. Genetic analysis and molecular markers were used to map Lr3ka. Results showed that RL6007 was resistant, while Thatcher was susceptible. The F₂ population showed segregation, and chi-square tests confirmed the expected 1∶3 ratio (χ²=1.362, P=0.243>0.05), indicating Lr3ka is a recessive major resistance gene. A total of 100 SSR markers were developed according to the wheat reference sequence of Chinese Spring (IWGSCv2.1), and five SSR markers, namely ZBSF6BL-5, ZBSF6BL-12, ZBSF6BL-61, ZBSF6BL-99, and ZBSF6BL-100, showed good polymorphism between parents. The five markers were used to detect the population, Lr3ka was mapped on 6BL, flanking by SSR marker ZBSF6BL-61 and ZBSF6BL-99 both with genetic distance of 0.1 cM. The physical interval of Lr3ka is 716.2-730.7 Mb corresponding to Chinese Spring reference genome sequence V2.1. The SSR markers can be used for marker-assisted selection (MAS), and it provided reference for the utilization of the gene.

Nine different winter and spring wheats (from China and Kazakhstan) were used as materials, the effects of autumn sowing at different periods［13 days ahead of sowing date (S1), normal sowing date (S2) and sowing date delay 13 days (S3)］ on the differentiation process, yield, and quality were investigated to provide references for wheat production regulation and introduction. The results showed on the same sowing date, the young spikes differentiation progress of spring wheat was faster than that of winter wheat. Young spike of winter wheat from Kazakhstan had faster differentiation progress than that from China, but the slower progress was found for spring wheat from Kazakhstan, comparing with Chinese spring wheat. With the delay of sowing date, the development time of winter and spring wheat spike was shortened. Under S1, S2 and S3 conditions, the young spike development of spring wheat from Kazakhstan was slower than that of Chinese spring wheat. Under S1 and S2 conditions, an obviously longer duration of single and double ridge stage was found for spike of spring wheat from Kazakhstan, comparing to that from China. Under S3 conditions, winter wheat from China had the shortest duration of the single ridge stage, while from Kazakhstan had the shortest duration of the single and double ridge stage. The response of grain yield and its components of winter and spring wheat to sowing date were also different. With the sowing date delayed, spikes number, kernels number per spike, thousand-kernel weight and grain yield of winter wheat were reduced, while spring wheat had a reduced spikes number, an increased thousand-kernel weight and grain yield. The change of sowing date had some effect on the grain protein and wet gluten content. With the delay of sowing date, grain protein and wet gluten content of Chinese winter wheat were reduced, but an opposite trend was found for wheat from Kazakhstan. For pasting properties, Chinese winter wheat had a reduced peak viscosity and breakdown, and an increased final viscosity with delayed sowing, while for winter wheat from Kazakhstan, peak viscosity and holding viscosity was initially decreased and then increased, and final viscosity and setback were increased. With the dalaying sowing date delayed, except for breakdown, pasting properties value of spring wheat showed an increasing trend. The breakdown of Chinese spring wheat was decreased, but an increased in breakdown was found for spring wheat from Kazakhstan. Yield and quality of different winter and spring wheat could be improved by appropriately adjusting sowing date. The results indicate early sowing could improve yield and gelatinization quality of winter wheat, and promote the protein accumulation of domestic winter wheat, while delay sowing time could obviously shorten the development time of young Spike, and improve the yield and gelatinization quality of spring wheat, conducing to protein accumulation of winter wheat in Kazakhstan. Thus, suitable sowing is beneficial to young spike development, yield and quality improvement of different winter and spring wheat.

NAC transcription factors play an important role in plant response to stress. In order to further understand the biological functions of salt-tolerant NAC transcription factors in wheat, the transcriptome of salt-tolerant material Cangmai 6005 and salt-sensitive material Kenong 9204 were sequenced. NAC transcription factors related to salt tolerance were screened and bioinformatics analyzed. RT-PCR was used to identify the key candidate genes by reverse transcription of cDNA and RNA extracted from the roots under salt stress. The results showed that among the 28 NAC transcription factors, 10 had alkaline isoelectric points and the others had acidic isoelectric points, and all of them were hydrophilic proteins. The protein secondary structure is mainly irregular curl and α-helix. In the collinearity analysis, there were many pairs of collinearity in wheat and rice, indicating that the close relationship between wheat and rice. The promoter region of NAC transcription factor contains many cis-regulatory elements related to hormone response and stress induction, among which TaNAC24 has the most (51) cis-regulatory element binding sites. The results of RT-qPCR showed that the expression levels of four genes were significantly up-regulated and five genes were significantly down-regulated after salt stress treatment, which was consistent with the results of transcriptome sequencing. These genes may mediate the response of wheat to salt stress.

To develop functional markers related to wheat plant type, we identified members of the wheat OTUBs family in this study, cloned a potential plant type-related gene, TaOTUB1, and analysed the expression pattern of the gene. The result showed that TaOTUB1 gene was widely expressed in various tissues of wheat and had the highest expression abundance among the 33 members of the wheat OTUBs family. The natural variation of the TaOTUB1 gene was analyzed using 748 wheat genome natural variation data, and it was found that two haplotypes, HapⅠ and HapⅡ, mainly existed in the TaOTUB1-A promoter region. The development of a dCAPS molecular marker based on SNPs at the -761 bp locus enabled the effective identification of HapⅠ and HapⅡ in 313 wheat varieties. Linkage analysis revealed that HapⅠ is an excellent haplotype for plant type improvement and yield increase. Evolutionary analysis revealed that HapⅠ is the dominant haplotype in domestic and foreign-cultivated wheat. These results can be helpful for plant type improvement and molecular marker-assisted selection breeding in wheat.

Fourteen colored wheat germplasms and two white wheat cultivars (control) were used to investigate the performance of major agronomic traits and nutritional qualities, and to evaluate by principal component analysis for excellent colored wheat germplasm. The results showed that Ziyou 5 had excellent effective tillering, number of spikes, yield, biomass and harvest index; Xihei 88 had good performance in spike length, kernel number and thousand-kernels weight. The nutritional quality of Xihei 88, Ziyou 11, Yanghei 1, Ziyou 5, Lingheimai 2, and Xihei-2 was better than that of the control. High variation coefficients were observed for effective tillering, spike length, yield, dough development time, stability time, peak viscosity and mineral nutrient elements of colored wheat, suggesting wide scope for improvement. Correlation analysis showed that kernel number per spike, 1 000-grain weight and number of panicles were significantly positively correlated with grain yield (P<0.01), and crude protein was significantly positively correlated with wet gluten, water absorption, dough development time and stability time (P<0.01). SDS-PAGE was used for HMW-GS identification. Eight subunit types (Null, 1, 2^*, 7+8, 7+9, 14+15, 2+12, 5+10) and seven subunit combinations were detected. Among the colored wheat, score of seven germplasm was up to 10, higher than that of white-grained wheat. Rare and high-quality subunits 14+15 was found in Xinongcaimai 007 and Yanghei 1. A total of five principal components were extracted from 18 main agronomic traits and nutritional quality by principal component analysis, and the cumulative contribution rate was 81.70%. The composite scores indicated that Xihei 88, Ziyou 11, and Xinongcaimai 3 had excellent overall performance, with high utilization value in agronomic traits and nutritional quality, which could be applied in colored wheat improvement.

The YABBY transcription factor is a type of plant specific transcription factor that plays an important role in leaf growth and floral organogenesis. It has a C2C2 zinc finger domain at the N-terminus and a spiral ring spiral YABBY domain at the C-terminus. This study used a spring wheat variety Xinchun 9 as the material and cloned a TaDL1 gene from the YABBY family, with a total coding region of 603 bp, encoding 201 amino acids. According to bioinformatics analysis, the molecular weight of TaDL1 protein was 22 765.21 Da, with an isoelectric point of 8.85, indicating an unstable hydrophilic protein. Through phylogenetic tree and conserved domain analysis, it was found that this gene belonged to the CRC subfamily of the YABBY family and was closely related to the rice OsDL gene. Through transient expression analysis of tobacco, TaDL1 protein was localized in the nucleus. Real time fluorescence quantitative analysis found that TaDL1 was specifically expressed in wheat young ears and leaves, with the highest expression level in leaves and second in young ears. TaDL1 responded to salt and heat stresses, with the most significant response to salt stress and sustained high expression levels within 2-24 h after stress. It is speculated that this gene may be involved in signaling pathways related to salt stress response.

Fusarium crown rot (FCR) seriously affects the yield and quality of wheat. Breeding and planting resistant cultivars is an important approach for reducing FCR damage. In order to obtain germplasm resources highly resistant to FCR, in this study, the FCR resistance of 194 wheat cultivars (lines) were evaluated, which widely planted in the whole country and Henan Province of China, using the dominant pathogen Fusarium pseudograminearum isolate WZ-8A in Huang-Huai wheat region at seedling stage in a greenhouse. The wheat cultivars/lines were detected using molecular markers, among which 25 quantitative trait loci (QTLs) associated with FCR resistance and five QTLs associated with Fusarium head blight (FHB). The results showed that among the 194 cultivars (lines), none of these wheat materials was either immune or highly resistant to FCR. Only three cultivars showed moderate resistance to FCR, accounting for 1.6% of the tested materials. While 34(15.5%) and 157(80.9%) were moderately, or highly susceptible to the disease, respectively. Out of the 30 molecular markers, 25 showed polymorphism among different cultivars (lines), and two of which, Xwmc397 and XsdauK86, were possibly associated with FCR resistance. Xwmc397 and XsdauK86 were linked to Qcr-Xwmc397 for FCR resistance and Fhb7 for FHB resistance, respectively. Disease index of wheat cultivars (lines) with Qcr-Xwmc397 was significantly lower than that of the cultivars (lines) without Qcr-Xwmc397 (P<0.05). Three cultivars (lines) with moderate resistance (Cunmai 128, Zhongyu 1123, and YN903-18) can be utilized as resistance germplasm sources for improving wheat FCR resistance. Two molecular markers screened may be used to breed wheat cultivars with FCR resistance.

Colored wheat, rich in anthocyanins, proteins, vitamins, folic acid, selenium, zinc, iron, and other nutritional components, exhibits therapeutic nutritional functions such as antioxidation, anti-inflammation, anti-cancer, blood sugar regulation, immune enhancement, anti-aging, and prevention of cardiovascular diseases. It serves as a valuable genetic resource for functional nutrition in wheat. Common types of the colored wheat include purple and blue grains, with the purple grain pigment gene predominantly expressed in the seed coat, following a maternal inheritance pattern. In contrast, the blue grain pigment gene is mainly expressed in the aleurone layer, exhibiting a pollen-sensitive inheritance pattern. To deeply understand the genetics and molecular mechanisms of colored wheat and to keep abreast of the latest research advancements, this article comprehensively reviewed and summarized the genetic characteristics of pigment accumulation in colored wheat, chromosomal localization, genetic mapping, molecular cloning, and mechanistic studies, and discussed relevant issues in the genetic improvement of colored wheat.