Recombination is crucial for crop breeding because it can break linkage drag and generate novel allele combinations. However, the high-resolution recombination landscape and its driving forces in soybean are largely unknown. Here, we constructed 8 recombinant inbred line (RIL) populations and genotyped individual lines using the high-density 600K SoySNP array, which yielded a high-resolution recombination map with 5,636 recombination sites at a resolution of 1.37 kb. The recombination rate was negatively correlated with transposable element density and GC content but positively correlated with gene density. Interestingly, we found that meiotic recombination was enriched at the promoters of active genes. Further investigations revealed that chromatin accessibility and active epigenetic modifications promoted recombination. Our findings provide important insights into the control of homologous recombination and thus will increase our ability to accelerate soybean breeding by manipulating meiotic recombination rate.

Recombination is crucial for crop breeding because it can break linkage drag and generate novel allele combinations. However, the high-resolution recombination landscape and its driving forces in soybean are largely unknown. Here, we constructed 8 recombinant inbred line (RIL) populations and genotyped individual lines using the high-density 600K SoySNP array, which yielded a high-resolution recombination map with 5,636 recombination sites at a resolution of 1.37 kb. The recombination rate was negatively correlated with transposable element density and GC content but positively correlated with gene density. Interestingly, we found that meiotic recombination was enriched at the promoters of active genes. Further investigations revealed that chromatin accessibility and active epigenetic modifications promoted recombination. Our findings provide important insights into the control of homologous recombination and thus will increase our ability to accelerate soybean breeding by manipulating meiotic recombination rate.

Recombination is crucial for crop breeding because it can break linkage drag and generate novel allele combinations. However, the high-resolution recombination landscape and its driving forces in soybean are largely unknown. Here, we constructed 8 recombinant inbred line (RIL) populations and genotyped individual lines using the high-density 600K SoySNP array, which yielded a high-resolution recombination map with 5,636 recombination sites at a resolution of 1.37 kb. The recombination rate was negatively correlated with transposable element density and GC content but positively correlated with gene density. Interestingly, we found that meiotic recombination was enriched at the promoters of active genes. Further investigations revealed that chromatin accessibility and active epigenetic modifications promoted recombination. Our findings provide important insights into the control of homologous recombination and thus will increase our ability to accelerate soybean breeding by manipulating meiotic recombination rate.