A maize near-isogenic line population designed for gene discovery and characterization of allelic effects. Zhong, T., Mullens, A., Morales, L., Swarts, K. L., Stafstrom, W. C., He, Y., Sermons, S. M, Yang, Q., Lopez-Zuniga, L. O., Rucker, E., Thomason, W. E., Nelson, R. J., Jamann, T., Balint-Kurti, P. J., & Holland, J. B. The Plant Journal, 122(5):e70228, 2025. _eprint: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/tpj.70228
A maize near-isogenic line population designed for gene discovery and characterization of allelic effects [link]Paper  doi  abstract   bibtex   
In this study, we characterized a panel of 1264 maize near-isogenic lines (NILs), developed from crosses between 18 diverse inbred lines and the recurrent parent B73, referred to as nested NILs (nNILs). In this study, 888 of the nNILs were genotyped using genotyping-by-sequencing (GBS). Subsequently, 24 of these nNILs, and all the parental lines, were re-genotyped using a high-density single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) chip. A novel pipeline for calling introgressions, which does not rely on knowing the donor parent of each nNIL, was developed based on a hidden Markov model (HMM) algorithm. By comparing the introgressions detected using GBS data with those identified using chip data, we optimized the HMM parameters for analyzing the entire nNIL population. A total of 2969 introgressions were identified across the 888 nNILs. Individual introgression blocks ranged from 21 bp to 204 Mbp, with an average size of 17 Mbp. By comparing SNP genotypes within introgressed segments to the known genotypes of the donor lines, we determined that in about one third of the lines, the identity of the donors did not match expectation based on their pedigrees. We characterized the entire nNIL population for three foliar diseases. Using these data, we mapped a number of quantitative trait loci (QTL) for disease resistance in the nNIL population and observed extensive variation in effects among the alleles from different donor parents at most QTL identified. This population will be of significant utility for dissecting complex agronomic traits and allelic series in maize.
@article{zhong_maize_2025,
	title = {A maize near-isogenic line population designed for gene discovery and characterization of allelic effects},
	volume = {122},
	copyright = {© 2025 The Author(s). The Plant Journal published by Society for Experimental Biology and John Wiley \& Sons Ltd.},
	issn = {1365-313X},
	url = {https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/tpj.70228},
	doi = {10.1111/tpj.70228},
	abstract = {In this study, we characterized a panel of 1264 maize near-isogenic lines (NILs), developed from crosses between 18 diverse inbred lines and the recurrent parent B73, referred to as nested NILs (nNILs). In this study, 888 of the nNILs were genotyped using genotyping-by-sequencing (GBS). Subsequently, 24 of these nNILs, and all the parental lines, were re-genotyped using a high-density single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) chip. A novel pipeline for calling introgressions, which does not rely on knowing the donor parent of each nNIL, was developed based on a hidden Markov model (HMM) algorithm. By comparing the introgressions detected using GBS data with those identified using chip data, we optimized the HMM parameters for analyzing the entire nNIL population. A total of 2969 introgressions were identified across the 888 nNILs. Individual introgression blocks ranged from 21 bp to 204 Mbp, with an average size of 17 Mbp. By comparing SNP genotypes within introgressed segments to the known genotypes of the donor lines, we determined that in about one third of the lines, the identity of the donors did not match expectation based on their pedigrees. We characterized the entire nNIL population for three foliar diseases. Using these data, we mapped a number of quantitative trait loci (QTL) for disease resistance in the nNIL population and observed extensive variation in effects among the alleles from different donor parents at most QTL identified. This population will be of significant utility for dissecting complex agronomic traits and allelic series in maize.},
	language = {en},
	number = {5},
	urldate = {2025-07-07},
	journal = {The Plant Journal},
	author = {Zhong, Tao and Mullens, Alex and Morales, Laura and Swarts, Kelly L. and Stafstrom, William C. and He, Yijian and Sermons, Shannon M and Yang, Qin and Lopez-Zuniga, Luis O. and Rucker, Elizabeth and Thomason, Wade E. and Nelson, Rebecca J. and Jamann, Tiffany and Balint-Kurti, Peter J. and Holland, James B.},
	year = {2025},
	note = {\_eprint: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/tpj.70228},
	keywords = {allelic series, disease resistance, maize, near isogenic line},
	pages = {e70228},
}

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