Frolence is a Masters Student that started Autumn 2024. Frolence (pronounced Florence) is working with two populations of barley to get at the genetic basis of susceptibility and resistance to Fusarium Head Blight, caused by the fungal organism Fusarium graminearum. This disease is increasing in incidence across North America and is a serious scourge of wheat and barley because the toxins it produces render the grain unsafe for human and livestock consumption. One population being worked with consists of approximately 250 lines that share the six-row genotype 'Wong' as an ancestor, either as a parent or grandparent. Lines in this population were created in the mid-20th Century by numerous North American barley breeding programs, because 'Wong' possessed a number of highly desirable traits, including exceptionally strong straw, winter-hardiness, and resistance to powdery mildew. In our first years of trialing lines in the Ohio scab nursery, Wong also exhibited pronounced resistance to FHB in the form of very low levels of accumulation of the fungal toxin deoxynivalenol (DON).
The second population consists of about 175 individuals that result from crosses to the Ohio selection GHRIL0201-088. GHRIL0201-088 has exhibited excellent malting quality, outstanding resistance to lodging, stem breakage, and in the 2022–23 Ohio scab nursery, the lowest levels of the fungal toxin DON. Lines in the GHRIL0201-088 population are derived from crosses to seven Ohio breeding lines that also exhibit very high malting quality. The uniqueness of this population is that each of the F1 were backcrossed to GHRIL0201-088 and to the respective second parent. Up to 20 backcrosses in each direction were made, resulting in about 40 backcross F2 lines (BC1F2) per original F1.
The rational for generating and using the Wong and GHRIL0201-088 BC1F2 populations is to simplify genetic analyses of FHB disease.