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Cover crops between rows in orchards can improve the development of soil resources and increase agricultural productivity. However, there have been few reports of cover crops that can act as a “green manure” in apple orchards across arid and semiarid zones. This study investigated the effects of planting interrow vegetation on soil properties and apple tree performance during a 32-month experiment. There were six treatments: clean cultivation as a control; natural grass planting; planting with ryegrass; planting with alfalfa; planting with tall fescue; and planting with villous wild pea cover crops. The treatments primarily affected the 0- to 20-cm surface soil layer. Soil carbon, nitrogen, and enzyme levels initially decreased (during the first 12–24 months); then, they increased (24–32 months). The cover crops significantly increased nutrient contents (soluble organic carbon, microbial carbon and nitrogen, alkaline dissolved nitrogen, nitrate nitrogen, and ammonium nitrogen) in the 0- to 20-cm soil layer by more than 19.6% and increased the related enzyme activities by more than 25.2%. The alfalfa and wild pea alleys had a stronger effect on the soil environment than the control, natural grass, ryegrass, and tall fescue alley treatments; however, after 32 months, the alfalfa treatment inhibited fruit tree growth and development. This was unexpected because alfalfa seemed to have a positive effect on soil fertility characteristics. Under local ecological conditions, villous wild pea had the greatest effect on apple orchard productivity and significantly increased short branching by 15.9%, fruit weight per fruit by 12.6%, yield per plant by 8.6%, and soluble sugar content by 10.5% compared with clean cultivation. The correlation analysis showed that there were significant or highly significant positive correlations between fruit tree performance and soil carbon, nitrogen, and enzyme activity levels as the soil layer depth increased. Therefore, under local ecological conditions, cover crops have a greater effect on orchard surface soil fertility than on deeper soils, and intercropping with villous wild pea potentially produces the greatest improvement in apple orchard productivity.
Leaves of Begonia semperflorens accumulate anthocyanins and turn red under low temperature (LT). In the present work, LT increased H2O2 content and superoxide anions production rate, causing significant increases in the activities of enzymes and contents of reduced components involved in the ascorbate-glutathione cycle (AsA-GSH cycle). As a result, LT-exposed seedlings increased the expression of genes involved in anthocyanin biosynthesis, and accumulated anthocyanin. Based on LT condition, application of N,N'-dimethylthiourea (DMTU) decreased reactive oxygen species (ROS) content, and unbalanced the AsA-GSH-controlled redox homeostasis. As a result, seedlings in the LT + DMTU group did not accumulate anthocyanin. Our results suggest that ROS may act as an important inducer in LT-induced anthocyanin biosynthesis.
Rust disease, incited by the fungus Uromyces vignae, adversely affects production and quality of asparagus bean and other types of cowpea in many parts of the world. Genetic resistance to the rust pathogen has been identified in a few accessions, but it is difficult to efficiently transfer the resistance to a broad range of asparagus bean cultivars using traditional breeding approaches. We determined that rust resistance was controlled by a single dominant gene designated Rr1 in the cross of a highly resistant cultivar ZN016 and highly susceptible cultivar Zhijiang 282. Bulked segregant analysis was applied to an F2 population derived from these parents, and an AFLP marker (E-AAG/M-CTG), 150 bp in size, was detected in the resistant bulk. The AFLP fragment was then converted to a SCAR marker, named ABRSAAG/CTG98, and the genetic distance between the marker and the Rr1 gene was estimated to be 5.4 cM. This SCAR marker could be used effectively for MAS of Rr1 in breeding programs to develop rust-resistant asparagus bean cultivars and potentially more widely to breed rust-resistant cultivars of other types of cowpea.
Colors of flower and seedcoat are interesting traits of asparagus bean, a cultivated subspecies of cowpea grown throughout Asia for its tender, long green pods. Little is known about the inheritance of these traits including their genome location. We report here the genetic analysis and mapping of the genes governing flower and seedcoat color in asparagus bean based on single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) and simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers. Analysis of the F1 and F7:8 generation of recombinant inbred lines (RILs) population showed a monogenetic inheritance of both traits. Purple flower and brown seedcoat are dominant over white flower and cream seedcoat, respectively. We further show that genes governing flower color and seedcoat color are tightly linked on LG8, ≈0.4 cM apart. Synteny analysis showed that the gene controlling seedcoat color in our study is syntenic to the soybean T locus. The use of the mapping information in asparagus bean breeding is discussed.