Institut für ökologische Chemie, Pflanzenanalytik und Vorratsschutz
Potatoes (Solanum tuberosum) are an important source of food and raw materials for humans. However, insect pests such as the Colorado potato beetle cause enormous losses in crop yield and quality. The control of the Colorado potato beetle is currently not efficiently possible with sustainable plant protection (e.g. collecting, beating, scent traps) and is therefore carried out conventionally using synthetic chemical pesticides. In organic farming, there is no efficiently effective way of protecting the plants.Wild potatoes are naturally resistant to Colorado potato beetles. Wild Solanum species therefore represent a promising source of resistance for breeding. Resistant cultivated potato varieties would bring significant economic benefits in organic farming as well as enormously reducing the intensity of plant protection measures in conventional farming.The Julius Kühn-Institut ZL has an extensive collection of somatic hybrids, crosses and backcrosses of various resistant wild species with cultivated potatoes. 100 of these lines will be cultivated at two locations in Germany (JKI-ZL, Groß-Lüsewitz and JKI-ÖPV, Berlin) in a randomized plot design. Since both locations were exposed to natural infestation with Colorado potato beetles every year, this is expected. The lines will be evaluated over the infestation period and infestation and defoliation will be quantified. The investigation of resistance traits under field conditions is essential, as laboratory trials and controlled cultivation of the plants can result in completely different characteristics and resistance mechanisms than natural field conditions. The results of the field trial will be correlated with existing data from metabolite analyses in order to describe bioactive, resistance-promoting ingredients that could be used as resistance markers in breeding.
Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture
