Filling gaps with construction of a genetic linkage map in tetraploid roses

Rose (Rosa sp.) is one of the most economically important ornamental crops worldwide. The present work contains a genetic linkage map for tetraploid roses that was constructed from an F1 segregation population using AFLP and SSR markers on 189 individuals. The preliminary ‘Yunzheng Xiawei’ and ‘Sun City’ maps consisted of 298 and 255 loci arranged into 26 and 32 linkage groups respectively. The recombined parental maps covered 737 cM and 752 cM of the genome respectively. The integrated linkage map was composed of 295 polymorphic loci that spanned 874 cM, and it had a mean intermarker distance of 2.9 cM. In addition, a set of newly developed EST-SSR markers that are distributed evenly throughout the mapping population were released. The work identified 67 anchoring points that came from 43 common SSR markers. The results that were produced from a large number of individuals (189) and polymorphic SSR loci (242) will enhance the ability to construct higher density consensus maps with the available diploid level rose maps, and they will definitely serve as a tool for accurate QTL and marker assisted selection.