Genetics of leaf and stripe rust resistance in a bread wheat

are themajor foliar diseases of wheat, resulting in yield loss all overthe world (Eversmeyer and Browder 1974; Kolmer 1996).The wheat cultivars become susceptible to rusts due to theirnarrow genetic base for resistance and the rapid rate of evo-lution of the pathogen, making it necessary to search for newsource(s) for resistance. Thus, the wheat productionhas beenlargely dependent on the development and the use of resis-tant cultivars having diverse and well characterized genes.So far, nearly 58 leaf rust and 40 stripe rust resistance geneshave been identified and designated as