In this study, we analyzed the growth characteristics and isoflavone content of 43 soybean varieties highly adaptable to highland areas. The flowering period of each cultivation zone was from July 15 to August 12 at Daewallyeong, from July 18 to August 11 at Jinbu, and from July 23 to August 13 at Gangneung. The accumulated temperature from flowering to maturity was 1,297 °C for Daegwallyeong, 1,391 °C for Jinbu, and 1,685 °C for Gangneung. Forty-three varieties were classified into four utilities; soy sauce and tofu, bean sprouts, cooking with rice, and vegetable and early maturity. The content of isoflavone was highest at 2,579 µg/g in varieties for soy sauce and tofu usage. Five varieties (“Paldalkong,” “Sinpaldal2,” “Ilmikong,” “Sinpaldalkong,” and “Daepung”) cultivated in Daegwallyeong had over 4,000 µg/g of isoflavone. The isoflavone content of the region Daegwallyeong was different at the significance level of 0.1 (p=0.061) compared to Gangneung. There was no significant difference between Gangneung and Jinbu. It is thought that the low temperature of the maturation stage during the growing period affected isoflavone accumulation. The varieties with more than 3,000 µg/g of isoflavone content in Daegwallyeong, Jindu, and Gangneung were “L29,” “Williams82,” “Ilmikong,” and “Daepung.” These were genetically and environmentally stable in isoflavone content. It is expected that this study will be used as basic data for the functional breeding and selection of soybean varieties highly adaptable to a specific region, and to help expand soybean cultivation areas in highlands.

The areas of soybean (Glycine max (L.) Merrill) cultivation in Gangwon-do have increased due to the growing demand for well-being foods. The soybean barcode system is a useful tool for cultivar identification and diversity analysis, which could be used in the seed production system for soybean cultivars. We genotyped cultivars using 202 insertion and deletion (InDel) markers specific to dense variation blocks (dVBs), and examined their ability to identify cultivars and analyze diversity by comparison to the database in the soybean barcode system. The genetic homology of “Cheonga,” “Gichan,” “Daewang,” “Haesal,” and “Gangil” to the 147 accessions was lower than 81.2%, demonstrating that these barcodes have potentiality in cultivar identification. Diversity analysis of one hundred and fifty-three soybean cultivars revealed four subgroups and one admixture (major allele frequency <0.6). Among the accessions, “Heugcheong,” “Hoban,” and “Cheonga” were included in subgroup 1 and “Gichan,” “Daewang,” “Haesal,” and “Gangil” in the admixture. The genetic regions of subgroups 3 and 4 in the admixture were reshuffled for early maturity and environmental tolerance, respectively, suggesting that soybean accessions with new dVB types should be developed to improve the value of soybean products to the end user. These results indicated that the two-dimensional barcodes of soybean cultivars enable not only genetic identification, but also management of genetic resources through diversity analysis.

Knowledge of the chromosomal constitution of the ancestors of modern soybean will complement plant breeding efforts to improve agronomic and economic characteristics of soybean. Variation block (VB)-based comparison using genome-wide insertion/deletion (InDel) markers was used on a diverse panel of 147 soybean cultivars to assess the impact of chromosomal changes during modern breeding. There were identical variation patterns of the examined InDels consistently appearing in the genome parts arising from parental varieties, indicating that soybean chromosomes in descendants should be all determined by genetic reshuffling of VBs inherited from parental chromosomes. Structure analysis of the accessions through the 202 InDels separated the accessions into four subgroups. Gene introgression revealed by the structure analysis agreed with the fact that a limited number of landraces and elite varieties were introduced and used as donors for breeding soybean cultivars in pedigree analysis. Especially, VBs became more reshuffled over time as a result of the breeding process, which resulted in using breeding parents with new VB-types for improving the end-use value of soybean. Therefore, their clustering using the 202 VB-specific InDels is strongly influenced by the difference in breeding ancestors among the subgroups. This indicates that the 202 InDel markers are very useful for genetic study by analyzing the reshuffling patterns of the parental genomes in the descendant.

Potato glycoalkaloids (PGA) are potentially toxic to human at high levels and current safety regulations have recommended that PGA content in tubers should not exceed 20 mg/100g·FW. The purpose of this study was to evaluate α -chaconine, α-solanine and total PGA content in tuber peel and flesh of 24 potato cultivars including ‘Haryeoung’, ‘Goun’, ‘Hongyoung’ and ‘Jayoung’. The total PGA ranged from 3.1 to 10.1 mg/100g·FW and 41-85% of total PGA was accumulated in tuber peel in all cultivars. Potato cultivars with lower level of PGA were ‘Jasim’ (3.1 mg/100g·FW) and ‘Goun’ (3.4 mg/100g·FW), whereas ‘Haryoung’ exhibited the highest level of PGA, 10.1 mg/100g·FW. Especially ‘Jasim’ and ‘Goun’ with the lower level of PGA can be consumed along with the peel on tubers. Also, these results provide the composition and levels of PGA in various potato cultivars for food safety and breeding of new cultivars with low levels of PGA for potato breeders and farmers.

Potato glycoalkaloids (PGAs) are potentially toxic to humans at high levels, and current safety regulations have recommended that PGAs content in tubers of potato cultivars should not exceed 20 mg/100gFW. Accordingly, it is important to determine the PGAs composition and level on potato cultivars for food safety and the breeding for new cultivars with low levels of PGAs. The main aim of this study was to evaluate α-chaconine, α-solanine, and total PGAs content in the peel and cortex portions in four recent cultivars (‘Haryoung’, ‘Goun’, ‘Hongyoung’ and ‘Jayoung’), released by Highland Agriculture Research Center, together with ‘Superior’ and ‘Atlantic’. The total PGAs ranged from 16.5 to 47.7 mg/100gFW. The α-solanine/α -chaconine ratio was 1:3.2 (‘Jayoung’), 1:3.5 (‘Hongyoung’) and 1:2 (‘Superior’), whereas α-solanine was not detected in ‘Goun’, ‘Atlantic’ and ‘Hongyoung’ under the analytical condition of this experiment. 75-94% of total PGAs was existed in the peel part of all cultivars. We selected two cultivars (‘Atlantic’ and ‘Goun’) showing lower PGAs content in the cortex part. During storage at 4°C, total PGAs content fluctuated widely in early stage of storage and stabilized gradually over time in ‘Hongyoung’, ‘Superior’ and ‘Jayoung’. Thus, through the selection of cultivars and storage conditions, these results will provide consumers and breeders with fundamental information about the content of PGAs in Korea major cultivars.