Molecular Mapping of Ty-4, a New Tomato Yellow Leaf Curl Virus Resistance Locus on Chromosome 3 of Tomato

Resistance to begomoviruses, including bipartite tomato mottle virus (ToMoV) and monopartite tomato yellow leaf curl virus (TVLCV), has been introgressed to cultivated tomato (Solomon Iycopersicum) from Salmon,: chilense accessions LA1932 and LA2779. A major gene, Ty-3, responsible for resistance to ToMoV and TYLCV was previously mapped on the long arm of chromosome 6. In the present study, we identified a 14-cM S. chilense introgression on the long arm of chromosome 3 in some resistant breeding lines derived from LA1932. A new begomovirus resistance locus, Ty-4, was mapped to the 2.3-cM marker interval between C2_At4g17300 and C2_At5g60160 in the introgression. Analysis of a population segregating for Ty-3 and Ty-4 demonstrated that Ty-3 accounted for 59.6% of the variance, while Ty-4 only accounted for 15.7%, suggesting that Ty-4 confers a lesser effect on TYLCV resistance. Recombinant inbred lines (RILs) with Ty-3 and Ty-4 had the highest level of TYLCV resistance. The PCR-based markers tightly linked to the Ty-4 locus as well as the Ty-3 locus have been recently used in our breeding program for efficient selection of high-levels of begomovirus resistance and now allow for efficient breeding by marker-assisted selection.