Characterization of a dwarf gene in Brassica rapa, including the identification of a candidate gene

Dwarf genes have been valuable for improving harvestable yield of several crop plants and may be useful in oilseed Brassica. We evaluated a dwarf gene, dwf2, from Brassica rapa in order to determine its phenotypic effects and genetic characteristics. The dwf2 mutant was insensitive to exogenous GA(3) for both plant height and flowering time, suggesting that it is not a mutation in the gibberellin biosynthesis pathway. The dwarf phenotype was controlled by a semidominant allele at a single locus. Near-isogenic lines that were homozygous or heterozygous for dwf2 had 47.4% or 30.0% reduction in plant height, respectively, compared to the tall wild-type line, and the reduction was due to reduced internode length and number of nodes. The dwf2 homozygous and heterozygous lines had the same or significantly higher numbers of primary branches than the wild-type line, but did not differ in flowering time. The DWF2 gene was mapped to the bottom of linkage group R6, in a region having homology to the top of Arabidopsis thaliana chromosome 2. The map position of DWF2 in comparison to markers in A. thaliana suggests it is a homolog of RGA (repressor of ga1-3), which is a homolog of the wheat Green Revolution gene. This dwarf gene could be used to gain more insight on the gibberellin pathway and to reduce lodging problems in hybrid oilseed Brassica cultivars.