Seedling lethality in wheat: a novel phenotype associated with a 2RS/2BL translocation chromosome.

When grown at normal temperatures, wheat plants disomic for a 2RS/2BL translocation chromosome substituting for chromosome 2B show seedling lethality. Morphological and physiological studies could not determine the cause of death. However, the seedling lethality can be partly to completely inactivated at higher temperatures and in stressed environments. The lethality can also be completely suppressed if the translocated chromosome is introduced into different wheat cultivars. These wheats must contain genes which suppress the lethal phenotype caused by disomy of 2RS/2BL.Whilst the temperature effect indicates that the seedling lethality is related to the grass clump dwarf phenotype of wheat, our results show that the genes involved in seedling lethality, its suppression and inactivation, are not related to the D genes which cause grass clump dwarfing in wheat.