Screening and characterization of molecular markers for sugarcane stem borer (Saccharum officinarum L.) resistance genes

Sugarcane (Saccharum officinarum L.) constitutes a main crop for production of sugar that serves as the main calorie source for public consumption. It is a particular challenge for the Government and related parties to ensure its availability. A decline in sugarcane production on agricultural land occurs due to disturbances by plant pests, especially stem borers. Stem borers can reduce sugar production by 52 to 73%. The purposes of the present study were to screen and detect genes resistant to stem borer attacks in 22 sugarcane cultivars and to characterize SacBBI4 as among the resistance gene markers in sugarcane. The present study produced 3 primer designs. The primer P-SacBBI4-A successfully amplified SacBBI4 gene at 729 bp, the primer P-SacBBI4-B at 624 bp, while the primer P-SacBBI4-C successfully amplified the target gene at 671 bp and same value were also obtained when analyzing the sequences on the Genstudio. As shown by the phylogenetic tree, two large clusters were formed. The first cluster was the WIP1 coding cluster, while the second one was the BBI coding cluster. The phylogenetic tree and genetic distance showed that the primer P-SacBBI4-C was the primer design closest to the target gene SacBBI4 on the NCBI data.