Hannah was recently awarded funding from the CFAES Internal Grants Program (IGP). This funding will help further Hannah's PhD work on her project, Pepper (Capsicum annuum L.) landrace diversity in resistance to Phytophthora capsici root rot.
The project duration is April 1st, 2023-March 31st, 2024. The aim of the project is to locate genetic variation in pepper that may help fields in Ohio resist Phytophthora capsici, the most damaging pepper pathogen. Genetic diversity in crop centers of domestication often includes variation in disease resistance, so Hannah plans to investigate our pepper collection from Mexico, where peppers originated. Hannah will challenge over 100 pepper landrace accessions with P. capsici sourced in Ohio. The peppers are already genotyped using genotyping-by-sequencing performed by previous PhD students Vivian Bernau and Nathan Taitano. Hannah plans to use a genome-wide association approach to locate regions of the genome where variation coincides with resistance. Results will aid in the development of breeder-friendly markers for future testing.