Race Specific Powdery Mildew Resistance in 31 Northwest European Wheat Cultivars

Race specific powdery mildew resistance in 23 winter wheat cultivars, eight spring wheat cultivars, and 14 lines/cultivars possessing known powdery mildew resistance genes, has been studied by analyzing host/pathogen interactions. The cultivars were tested as intact seedlings, and as detached primary leaf segments on water agar; both methods revealed reproducible and concordant results. The 45 cultivars/lines were divided into 24 resistance spectra according to the patterns of reaction to the powdery mildew isolates used. Of the 31 cultivars investigated, eight did not possess any of the resistance genes detected, and the remaining 23 were divided in 16 resistance spectra. The race specific resistance of nine cultivars was conferred by the single resistance genes Pm2, Pm4b, Pm5/Ml-i: or Pm6, while the race specific resistance of 14 cultivars was conferred by 2, 3, 4 or 5 genes in combination.