Recent release of whole genome draft sequences in legume species have led comparative genome studies among legume plants including Glycine max, G. soja, Cajanus cajan and Medicago truncatula. The majority of comparative genomic researches have been conducted based on synteny of coding sequences and coding sequence variations may be one of major forces for speciation and evolution. However, non-coding sequences have been also reported to be important phenotypic regulators. Especially, since short sequence motifs in the promoter regions are highly conserved, they are suggested to be another resources of interests in comparative studies. In this study, we predicted the conserved short sequence motifs by BLASTN algorithm using dicot promoter database from Softberry (http://www.softberry.com). A total of 37,396 conserved short sequence motifs were identified onto 2 kb upstreams of 46,367 high confident gene model of G. max (cv. Williams 82). Meanwhile, whole genome of 7 soybean landraces (G. max) and 7 wild soybean genotypes (G. soja) were sequenced at low depth of less than ten using Illumina Hiseq 2000. Among these genotypes, nucleotide variations were identified in predicted conserved regulatory motifs by mapping of short reads to the reference genome sequence using the Samtools program (http://samtools.sourceforge.net/). Fifteen and two genes, which have SNPs in regulatory motifs and no SNP in coding sequence, were identified by comparisons of inter-species and intra-species, respectively. qRT-PCR experiments are in progress for investigating differences of these 17 genes expressions at transcriptional level.

As soybean (Glycine max) is known for its high nutritional value of oil and protein, soybean has been domesticated and cultivated by one specific character trait based on human selection. Importantly, tracing back in time where G. max and G. soja, the undomesticated ancestor of G. max have diverged plays an important role in studying of genetic diversity and in investigating the common ancestor of soybean. In this study, we sequenced 6 G. max and 6 G. soja using Illumina’s Hiseq 2000 with a low coverage sequencing technology to estimate the divergence of times between genotypes and populations. A total of the 12 genotypes were sequenced at the average depth of 6.5 and resulted 892.5 Mb and 903.3 MB consensus sequences with the coverage of 91.54% and 92.65% for G. max and G. soja, respectively. The whole genome SNP analysis showed that G. max had lower frequency levels of polymorphism (~0.1%) than G. soja (~0.25%). And, a high number of SNPs located in introns were found among 6 G. soja genotypes as SNPs were approximately twice than those found in 6 G max. The number of SNPs in G. max intronic regions was 53,134, whereas a total of 133,329 SNPs were discovered in G. soja introns. Almost an equal number of SNPs were discovered in 5’ UTR and exon regions; however, different numbers of SNP in CDS and 3′ UTR were identified. By the rate of nonsynonymous change, divergence of time between G. soja and G. max would be investigated.

The amount of genetic variability of a species is essential for its survival and adaptation in different environments, and studies of genetic diversity using molecular markers are necessary to understand the genetic structure of a population and to orientate effective strategies of germplasm conservation. The aim of current study was to determine the SSR markers that can be used rapidly and reliably to evaluated the pepper of Bulgaria landraces, and applied the markers to assement of introduce genetic diversity of the pepper germplasm. We used 22 polymorphic microsatellite markers to analysis of genetic diversity within 61 pepper collection of Bulgaria landraces germplasm, all SSR primers pairs produced 80 polymorphic and reproducible amplification fragments. An average value of polymorphic information contents (PIC) were 0.334 with a range of 0.061 to 0.63. The mean values of observed (HO) and expected heterozygosity (HE) were 0.383 and 0.154, respectively, indicating a considerable amount of polymorphism within this collection. A genetic distance-based phylogeny grouped into three distinct groups, which was the landrace, moderate and wilde type, genetic distance (GD) value was 0.540. An average day of flowering time was 53 days with a range of 45 to 60 days. The everage od fruit length and width were 9.38cm with a range 2.1 to 23.6cm, and 3.51cm with a range 0.6 to 8.9cm, respectively. Molecular data were complemented with morphological measurements according to the descriptor list for the pepper collection of Bulgaria landraces germplasm.

The objective of this study was to rapidly evaluate fatty acids in a collection of foxtail millet (Setaria italica (L.) P. Beauv) of different origins so that this information could be disseminated to breeders to advance germplasm use and breeding. To develop the calibration equations for rapid and nondestructive evaluation of fatty acid content, near-infrared reflectance spectroscopy (NIRs) spectra (1104-2494 nm) of samples ground into flour (n=100) were obtained using a dispersive spectrometer. A modified partial least-squares model was developed to predict each component. For foxtail millet germplasm, our models returned coefficients of determination (R2) of 0.91, 0.89, 0.98 and 0.98 for strearic acid, oleic acid, linoleic acid, and total fatty acids, respectively. The prediction of the external validation set (n=10) showed significant correlation between references values and NIRs values (r2=0.97, 0.91, 0.99 for oleic, linoleic, and total fatty acids, respectively). Standard deviation/standard error of cross-validation (SD/SECV) values were greater than 3 (3.11, 5.45, and 7.50 for oleic, linoleic, and total fatty acids, respectively). These results indicate that these NIRs equations are functional for the mass screening and rapid quantification of the oleic, linolenic, and total fatty acids characterizing foxtail millet germplasm. Among the samples, IT153491 showed an especially high content of fatty acids (84.06 mg g-1), whereas IT188096 had a very low content (29.92 mg g-1).

Specialty barley extracts were prepared and investigated for its antioxidant activity and biological activity. Hunter L* values of the Iksan 86 extracts had higher than that of the Iksan 87 and Zasoojeongchal extracts. The extraction yields of Iksan 86, Iksan 87, and Zasoojeongchal was 8.08, 6.62, and 7.30%, respectively. The contents of total phenolic compounds of the Iksan 86, Iksan 87, and Zasoojeongchal extracts were 16.24, 15.51, and 13.95 GAE mg/g of sample, respectively. The DPPH radical scavenging activity of Iksan 86, Iksan 87, and Zasoojeongchal extracts were 50.00, 33.27, and 7.56% at a 500 ppm, respectively. The samples showed an inhibition of xanthin oxidase. ACE inhibition effect of specialty barley extracts, Iksan 86, Iksan 87, and Zasoojeongchal, was 39.81, 41.06, and 27.78%, respectively. Tyrosinase inhibition rates (%) of Iksan 86, Iksan 87, and Zasoojeongchal extracts were 26.21, 24.57, and 20.00%, respectively. Results indicated that specialty barley extracts possesses various biological activities including antioxidative capacity, xanthin oxidase inhibition activity, angiotensin converting enzyme inhibition activity, and tyrosinase inhibition activity.

Phytic acid, myo-inositol (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6)-hexakisphosphate, is a material that plants store phosphorus in seeds. Phytic acid is classified as an antinutrient because of indigestibility. Non-ruminant animals, such as human and swine, excrete unavailable phytic acid. The unavailable phytic acid run off to ground water, river, sea, causing eutrophication as a factor. Accordingly, low-phytic acid crops draw the attention due to both nutritional and environmental reasons. Using more than 900 Glycine accessions including G. max, G. soja and G. gracillis, colormetric method was applied for detecting low-phytic acid mutant. Two hundred fifty accessions were screened by the colormetric method so far, but no mutant was identified. Screening of mutants with the rest 710 accessions is in progress. MIPS1 (D-myo-inositol 3-phosphate synthase) is considered as gene related to phytic acid content in soybean. Also, lpa1 (Zea mays low phytic acid 1) known as controlling phytic acid content in maize was recently reported that homologs of lpa1 were responsible for phytic acid content in soybean and located on linkage groups L and N (Chromosomes 19 and 3). After primers were designed from these three candidate genes for phytic acid content, identification of genes responsible for low phytic acid and investigation of genetic variation among 960 accessions will be performed as further study.