Genetic targeting of candidate genes for drought sensitive gene eibi1 of wild barley (Hordeum spontaneum)

Drought stress is one of the most severe abiotic stresses that cause the loss of crop yield. The cuticle protects the leaf from dehydration in the face of drought stress. The barley cuticle mutant eibi1 is highly drought sensitive. Here, we describe the fine-scale genetic mapping of the eibi1 locus, based on a cv. Morex × eibi1 F₂ population of 1,682 individuals. Barley-rice synteny was exploited to identify markers for mapping and to identify candidate genes for Eibi1. The target segment of chromosome 3H is perfectly collinear with the equivalent region on rice chromosome 1. Marker enrichment delimited eibi1 to a 0.11 cM barley region defined by the interval BI958842-Os01g0176800*, which in rice consists of a 112.8 kbp segment. Gene prediction revealed that this rice segment harbours 16 genes. Of them, five (Os01g0177100, Os01g0177200, Os01g0177900, Os01g0178200 and Os01g0178400) were proposed as candidate genes of Eibi1.