Alteration of physiological and biochemical properties in leaves and fruits of pomegranate in response to gamma irradiation.

Pomegranate breeding to improve the marketability requires the production of large and high quality fruits. Gamma radiation on pomegranate can be used to generate genetic diversity that allows the breeder to screen the mutants for superior quality and quantity. For this purpose, dormant buds on 1-year-old shoots of pomegranate cultivar "Malase Saveh" were subjected to 36 Gy (Gy) of gamma irradiation from a cobalt (60CO) source. Shoot cuttings were taken from the mutated shoots and generate M1V2. The number of 11 mutants were selected from M1V2 plants based on their winter survival and disease resistance. After a period of 3-4 years, leaf and fruit samples were harvested from the M1V5. Results showed that physiological and biochemical parameters of leaves were altered unevenly, some clones showed no alterations from the control, while others revealed considerable differences. Irradiation altered various aspects related to fruit, such as the number and weight of ripe and unripe fruits, number of cracked, sunburn, worm-eaten fruits, and fruit size. In general, mutant clones 5, 8, and 10 had higher fruit sizes and weight of ripe fruits and less number and weight of unripe fruits. The stability of the detected mutants will be evaluated and new commercial field trials using selected materials will be established.

Marker-assisted selection for recognizing wheat mutant genotypes carrying HMW glutenin alleles related to baking quality.

Allelic diversity of HMW glutenin loci in several studies revealed that allelic combinations affect dough quality. Dx5 + Dy10 subunits are related to good baking quality and Dx2 + Dy12 are related to undesirable baking quality. One of the most regular methods to evaluate the baking quality is SDS-PAGE which is used to improve baking quality labs. Marker-assisted selection is the method which can recognize the alleles related to baking quality and this method is based on polymerase chain reaction. 10 pairs of specific primers related to Dx2, Dx2.1, Dx5, Dy10, and Dy12 subunits were used for recognizing baking quality of some wheat varieties and some mutant genotypes. Only 5 pairs of them could show the specific bands. All subunits were recognized by the primers except Dx2.1. Some of the primers were extracted from previous studies and the others were designed based on D genome subunits of wheat. SDS-PAGE method accomplished having confidence in these marker's results. To realize the effect of mutation, seed storage proteins were measured. It showed that mutation had effect on the amount of seed storage protein on the mutant seeds (which showed polymorphism).