抄録
Wheat, as one of the most important staple crops worldwide, faces severe challenges of heat stress on yield and quality under global warming, highlighting the urgent need for systematic identification of heat-tolerant germplasm and dissection of heat tolerance genes to ensure food security and advance molecular breeding. In this study, a rapid seedling-stage heat tolerance evaluation system was established using artificial climate chamber treatments with diverse wheat germplasm resources, and heat tolerance was systematically assessed based on seedling survival rate. On this basis, a genome-wide association study (GWAS) was conducted using single-nucleotide polymorphism arrays, candidate genes were screened by integrating transcriptome data, and the expression patterns of several genes were validated by qPCR. The results revealed significant variation in heat tolerance among accessions, with some materials exhibiting strong heat tolerance potential; multiple significant loci associated with heat tolerance were identified by GWAS, and a set of potential candidate genes was discovered; further validation revealed several genes playing key roles in wheat heat tolerance. This study not only established an efficient evaluation system for seedling-stage heat tolerance in wheat but also clarified its genetic basis and identified key candidate genes, providing important theoretical insights and practical support for heat-tolerant wheat germplasm innovation and molecular design breeding.
