DisplayTitle

A Study of Puroindoline b Gene Involvement in the Milling Behavior of Hard-Type Common Wheats

¹INRA, UMR 1208, Ingénierie des Agropolymères et Technologies Emergentes, 2 Place Viala, F-34060 Montpellier Cedex 01, France. ²ARVALIS—Institut du végétal, Station Expérimentale, F-91720 Boigneville, France. ³INRA, UMR 1095, Génétique Diversité et Ecophysiologie des Céréales, 234 avenue du Brézet, F-63039 Clermont-Ferrand, Cedex 2, France. ⁴UFS, 17 rue du Louvre, F-75001 Paris, France. ⁵Corresponding author. UMR Ingénierie des Agropolymères et Technologies Emergentes, 2 Place Viala, F-34060 Montpellier Cedex 01, France. Phone: 33 (0)4 99 61 31 05. Fax: 33 (0)4 99 61 30 76. E-mail: lullien@supagro.inra.fr

Differences in milling behavior among hard-type common wheat (Triticum aestivum) cultivars are well known to millers. Among them, the French cultivar Soissons, which contains the Pinb-D1d allelic form of the puroindoline b gene, is particularly distinguished for its high milling value. Near-isogenic lines (NILs) differing by the allelic forms of the puroindoline b gene, Pinb-D1d or Pinb-D1b (one of the most frequent alleles found in the European wheat population), were constructed. Grain characteristics obtained after wheat cultivation in distinct environmental conditions were compared between NILs and the cultivar Soissons, as was their fractionation behavior. Results showed that NILs containing the Pinb-D1d allele displayed lower values of grain hardness and vitreousness than did the corresponding lines containing the Pinb-D1b allelic form under the same cultivation conditions. Both genetic background and environmental conditions appeared to affect grain texture. Measured single-kernel characterization system hardness index values of the samples under study were found to be correlated with the vitreousness values. Studies of the milling behavior helped to point out that grain vitreousness is an important factor acting on endosperm breakage ability, whatever the genetic background of the wheat. Our results also demonstrated that, at similar levels of vitreousness, the endosperm of Soissons could more easily be reduced than that of other wheat lines.