Key points are not available for this paper at this time.
The Silk Road significantly expedited both cultural and biological exchanges between East and West, especially Eurasia. As an important source of essential oil, Rosa ‘Hetian’ serves as a popular edible variety in the Hotan Prefecture (Xinjiang, China), a key node along the Silk Road. However, its exact origin remains obscure, severely hindering related breeding programs. In this study, by incorporating analyses from the chloroplast genome and phased Internal Transcribed Spacer s ( ITS s) together with whole-genome single-nucleotide-polymorphisms (SNPs), we postulated the potential close relatives for once-flowering R. ‘Hetian’. With a well-supported chloroplast genome phylogeny covering three subgenera and all ten sections of subgenus Rosa , we inferred R. gallica as the most likely maternal donor of R . ‘Hetian’. R . ‘Hetian’ and R. gallica shared one and three haplotypes of ITS1 and ITS2 , respectively, further supporting the maternal progenitor scenario. Reticulate network and principal component analyses with 4,150,954 SNPs revealed that species in sect. Caninae and R. gallica contributed the paternal and maternal genetic resources to R . ‘Hetian’, respectively, suggesting one or more as-yet-unidentified hybridization events during its formation. Our analysis strongly supported R. rugosa being the most likely paternal progenitor of R . ‘Kushui’ and R. ‘Tuwei’, two other edible varieties along the Silk Road. Finally, we updated the reticulated origin pattern for the main edible roses used in China (EdiRose2.0). Our study sheds fresh and advanced genomic insights into the complex evolution of edible roses, elucidating the profound impact of human activities on plant breeding across Eurasia, particularly along the Silk Road.
Zhang et al. (Fri,) studied this question.