Evaluation of soybean cultivars for resistance to phomopsis seed decay in Korea

Phomopsis seed decay (PSD), primarily caused by Phomopsis longicolla, is one of the most important seed-borne diseases and causes serious seed yield loss in soybean. This study was performed to evaluate reactions to P. longicolla in Korean soybean major elite cultivars, which were mainly used for parents of genetic mapping populations. The natural incidence of P. longicolla and other seed-borne fungi was determined in the fields at three different locations in South Korea during 2009–2010. The significant differences in sensitivity to seed-borne diseases were shown among cultivars. Taekwangkong exhibited the greatest resistance to P. longicolla with average incidence of 0.33% and other seed-borne fungi with average incidence of 6.17%. Moreover, Taekwangkong was free of P. longicolla infection both in Milyang and in Daegu. To confirm the effective resistance source, the Korean virulent strain of P. longicolla, SSLP-3, was inoculated artificially on soybean of R4–R7 growth stage in the greenhouse. Taekwangkong exhibited a higher level of resistance to P. longicolla with significantly lower incidence (8.67%) than any other Korean elite cultivars (78.0–99.33%) and the previously reported resistant PI genotypes (35.0–55.67%). Further verification of resistance in Taekwangkong to P. longicolla by testing germination vigor of healthy seeds in vitro showed a higher germination rate than those of the susceptible cultivars. It could be suggested that Taekwangkong is a newly identified resistance source and the better source of resistance to P. longicolla to develop breeding populations for exploiting resistance gene(s) in further studies.