Salam Y. Abu-Zaitoun, Munqez J. Shtaya, Rana M. Jamous, Omar B. Mallah, Mohammed S. Ali-Shtayeh - Biodiversity & Environmental Research Center (BERC), Til 458, Palestine;
Siwar Assili , Zvi Peleg - The Robert H. Smith Faculty of Agriculture, Food and Environment, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Hanan Sela, Assaf Distelfeld - School of Plant Sciences and Food Security, Tel Aviv University
Nawal Alhajaj - Field Crop Department, National Agricultural Research Center (NARC), P.O.B 639, Baqa’ 19381, Jordan;
Drought is the major environmental factor limiting wheat production worldwide.
Developing novel cultivars with greater drought tolerance is the most viable solution to ensure
sustainable agricultural production and alleviating threats to food-security. Here we established a
core-collection of landraces and modern durum wheat cultivars (WheatME, n = 36), from the Middle
East region (Jordan, Palestine and Israel) aiming at unlocking the genetic and morpho-physiological
adaptation to semi-arid environment conditions. Interestingly, genetic analysis of the WheatME
core-collection could not distinguish the landraces according to their country of origin. Field-based
evaluation of the core-collection conducted across range of contrasting environmental conditions:
Til-Palestine, Bet-Dagan-Israel and Irbid-Jordan with annual precipitation of 500 mm, 360 mm and
315 mm, respectively. The Til environment showed highest grain yield while the Irbid environment
showed the lowest values. Analysis of variance showed a significant Genotype Environment
interaction for plant phenology traits (plant height and heading date) and productivity traits
(1000-kernel weight, and grain yield). Principal component analysis showed three main cultivar
groups: High yielding lines (modern durum cultivars, and landraces), tall late flowering landraces,
and landraces with high grain weight. This knowledge could serve as basis for future breeding efforts
to develop new elite cultivars adapted to the Mediterranean Basin’s semi-arid conditions.
Received: 26 September 2018; Accepted: 17 October 2018; Published: 21 October 2018
