Figure 3.
Graphic description of rice blast caused by M. oryzae, and sheath blight disease caused by R. solani of cultivated rice. Seedling blast disease (A) enlarged typical diamond shape lesion of leaf blast (B), panicle blast showing 90% crop loss (C) and sheath blight disease of rice showing typical symptom on sheath (D).
These two diseases have existed in commercial rice fields for hundreds of years and weedy rice has adapted and evolved to survive these two biological stressors. Resistance to
M. oryzae is governed by race specific major resistance (
R) genes and minor QTLs. Resistance to
R. solani could be governed by QTLs. However, major
R genes to
R. solani have not been discovered in rice germplasm. Weedy rice, that competes with cultivated rice, possesses ancient untapped and novel
R genes. For instance, Zhao et al. [
79] studied blast resistant
Ptr allele in black hull weedy rice. The
Ptr gene, previously named as
Pi-ta2 in rice, encodes a protein with 4 armadillo repeats conferring a broad spectrum of resistance except for blast race IB33 [
79]. Race IB33 is one of the most virulent blast races identified on the plant in our laboratory but not found in commercial fields. Sequence analysis of the
Ptr allele from weedy rice, PtrBHA, identified a unique amino acid, glutamine (Gln) at protein position 874. This amino acid is absent in susceptible individuals. Minor changes in protein conformation of PtrBHA are predicted to create novel resistance to race IB33. Using genotyping by sequencing (GBS), a total of 28 resistance QTLs were identified in two US weedy rice ecotypes [
80]. These resistance QTLs, some with large effects and others with small effects, suggest that US weedy rice has adapted to blast disease using both major
R genes and QTLs. These
R genes have not been found in cultivated rice varieties suggesting that they are newly evolved
R genes. In another study, sheath blight resistance QTLs were identified using two recombinant inbred line mapping populations derived from crosses of an indica crop variety, Dee-Geo-Woo-Gen (DGWG), with progeny representing straw hull (SH) and black hull awned (BHA) [
81]. A total of nine QTLs were identified, five of which were attributable to alleles for plant height and days to heading. Four sheath blight resistance QTLs were identified by treating these growth traits as covariates. Two of these QTLs,
qShB1-2 and
qShB4, are new that were not identified in the study by Yan et al. [
81].
Pi-ta is another effective
R gene deployed to control rice blast disease in many rice growing regions of the world. Weedy rice genotypes containing the resistant
Pi-ta allele showed a high level of resistance to two predominant US blast races, IB49 and IC17. The
Pi-ta gene on rice chromosome 12 encodes a predicted nucleotide binding site and leucine rich domain which directly interacts with the product of
M. oryzae avirulence gene
AVR-Pita1 during resistant responses [
83,
84]. The genome organization of the
Pi-ta gene in weedy rice was investigated in a few studies to determine if gene flow between cultivated and weedy rice had occurred in the USA [
82] The resistant
Pi-ta allele was found in most of the investigated US weedy rice genotypes. The genomic region with the
Pi-ta allele in US weedy rice was found to be very similar to that of cultivated rice [
82]. The flanking sequences of the
Pi-ta gene and SSR marker analysis revealed that the susceptible
pi-ta allele and the non-resistant
Pi-ta allele had been introgressed from US cultivated rice to weedy rice through gene flow. This may be because the
Pi-ta gene has not been widely deployed in the USA. In conclusion, these findings on rice blast and sheath blast diseases demonstrate that novel
R genes from weedy rice can be used in combination with favorable growth traits to develop rice germplasm that are resistant to rice blast and sheath blast.