Most major resistance genes for stripe rust in wheat have proven to be race-specific, virulent isolates of the pathogen, Puccinia striiformis f.sp. tritici rapidly increasing in frequency within the pathogen population after deployment of the resistance. However, sources of stripe rust resistance which have proven “durable” – a resistance which has been deployed over considerable acreage and time in an environment conducive to the disease, have been identified. However, many of these durable sources of stripe rust resistance confer only partial resistance and are not expressed at the seedling growth stage.

In the UK and across Europe many breeders increasingly look to partial and adult plant expressed sources of resistance to control disease, including stripe rust. Some work has been done to begin to characterise partial and APR to stripe rust in European germplasm to determine the genetic biodiversity for this trait. However, we are making the assumption that because these resistances at partial, and adult plant expressed they are more likely to be durable.

Work will be presented that defines the genetics of stripe rust APR in UK wheats and a number of potentially novel sources of resistance. The cytology of the interaction between P.s. f.sp. tritici and partial, APR in wheat will be presented with the view to identifying features of the interaction that may be indicators of potential durability.