Backcrossing is a trait introgression method of renewed importance in crops. The evolution of introgressed or substituted
segments through backcross generations has been analyzed theoretically using simulations. In this study, the content of donor
genomes, including donor segment number (DSN), donor segment length (DSL), and donor genome size (DGS), were directly analyzed
in six crosses over three successive backcrosses using a set of single sequence repeat (SSR) markers covering the entire rice
genome. The results of this analysis demonstrated that the average DSN in each genome was 8.39 in BC
2F
1, 4.13 in BC
3F
1, and 2.41 in BC
4F
1, decreasing nearly by half with each backcrossing. The average DSL was 33.43 cM (centiMorgans) in BC
2F
1, 29.04 cM in BC
3F
1, and 25.07 cM in BC
4F
1, display a progressive decrease slightly greater than 10% in each additional backcross generation. Meanwhile the average
DGS was 280.51 cM in BC
2F
1, 119.97 cM in BC
3F
1, and 60.53 cM in BC
4F
1, decreasing 57.2% from BC
2F
1 to BC
3F
1 and 50.4% from BC
3F
1 to BC
4F
1. This revealed that the reduction in DGS was approximately 50% with each backcrossing. These results provide a guide for
introgression or substitution of target chromosome segments from donors into recipients in backcross programs.
Keywords Backcross - Donor chromosome segment - Genome - SSR - Rice
Zhang-Ying Xi and Feng-Hua He contributed equally to this work.