Modulation of quantitative trait loci for Arabidopsis thaliana seed performance by the maternal and germination environment

The quality of seeds contributes to plant performance, especially during germination and in the young seedling stage, and hence affects the economic value of seed crops. A seed’s innate quality is determined during seed development and the following seed maturation phase. It is tightly controlled by the genetic make-up of the mother plant and further shaped by the environmental conditions of the mother plant. The interaction between genotype and environment can result in substantial quantitative variation in seed traits like dormancy and viability.Making use of naturally occurring variation within the Arabidopsis thaliana germplasm, we studied the interaction between seed production environments and the genetic architecture of mother plants on diverse seed quality traits. An Arabidopsis Bayreuth-0 x Shahdara recombinant inbred line (RIL) population was grown in four different seed production environments: high temperature, high light, low phosphate, and control conditions. The seeds harvested from the mother plants that were exposed to these environments from flowering until seed harvest were subsequently subjected to germination assays under standard and mild stress conditions (cold, heat, osmotic stress and added phytohormone ABA). Quantitative trait locus (QTL) analysis identified many environmental-sensitive QTLs (QTL x E) as well as several interactions between the maternal and germination environments. Variation in the number and position of the QTLs was largely determined by the germination conditions, however effects of the maternal environment were clearly present regarding the genomic location as well as significance of the individual QTLs.Together, our findings uncover the extensive environmental modulation of the genetic influence on seed performance and how this is shaped by the genetic make-up of the mother plant. Our data provides a systems-view of the complex genetic basis of genotype-by-environment interactions determining seed quality.Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest.