Nothofagus pumilio and N. antarctica: The Most Widely Distributed and Cold-Tolerant Southern Beeches in Patagonia

CAROLINA SOLIANI; PASTORINO, MARIO; APARICIO, ALEJANDRO G.; SCHINELLI, TERESA; PAULA MARCHELLI; MATTERA, M. GABRIELA; ANA DELIA TORRES; MONDINO, VÍCTOR; GALLO, LEONARDO; TEJERA, LUIS

Low Intensity Breeding of Native Forest Trees in Argentina

Springer

Año: 2020; p. 117 - 148

The frst genetic studies on forest trees in Argentina were carried out with exotic fast-growing species and in relation to their productive use. These antecedents, conducted mainly by the National Institute of Agricultural Technology (Instituto Nacional de Tecnología Agropecuaria, INTA), date back to the 1950s and were based on feld trials of poplars, willows, pines, and eucalypts, which were eventu-ally developed as formal genetic improvement programs (Marcó et al. 2016).It was not until the 1980s that genetic studies of native forest species began. The initial work was carried out at the University of Buenos Aires, where the frst doctoral thesis on population genetics of a native forest species (Saidman 1985) was defended. Since the 1990s, new scientifc groups commenced to develop with similar lines of research, in several INTA groups and in other national universities such as Comahue, Misiones, and Córdoba, expanding the objects of study to a variety of genera and species.In the beginning, the lack of knowledge about the genetic resources of the forest species from Argentina promoted studies of genetic characterization of their natural populations, by means of genetic markers (initially isoenzymes and then RAPD, AFLP, RFLP, and more recently SSR). These frst steps advanced toward the study of demo-stochastic evolutionary processes (i.e., drift and gene fow) using neutral genetic markers as tools, and a little later, toward the study of adaptation and phe-notypic plasticity through the analysis of variation in quantitative traits in common garden trials. Currently, this type of approach continues to expand the range of spe-cies involved and questions addressed, and furthermore, the use of new tools for the generation of genomic resources, the identifcation of candidate genes, and the analysis of full transcriptomes have been added to study selection processes also with molecular markers (see Chap. 17).Based on the knowledge gained about the genetic resources of native forest trees but focusing on their use, INTA (with the collaboration of research groups from other institutions) formally initiated domestication programs for the most relevant species in 2006, which fnally led to the development of low-intensity breeding programs. Given its national projection, INTA implements these programs through-out the country, covering all forest ecosystems in Argentina. For the selection of species, in addition to practical aspects such as the region of concern of each research group, the ecological and/or productive value (current or potential) of the species considered was weighted.