Translational Research in Plant Breeding

A special issue of Agronomy (ISSN 2073-4395). This special issue belongs to the section "Crop Breeding and Genetics".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 December 2021) | Viewed by 23840

Special Issue Editors


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Guest Editor
Department of Plant Sciences, University of Saskatchewan, 51 Campus Dr, Saskatoon, SK S7N 5A8, Canada
Interests: crop breeding and genetics; molecular breeding; agronomy; stress physiology; legumes; faba bean

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor

Special Issue Information

Dear colleagues,

Considerable progress has been made in pure plant science research in the last two decades, including our understanding of plant genomes. Nevertheless, relatively few novel ideas have been tested in a breeding context. Translational research should be adopted as a link between fundamental research and plant breeding, as it adds value to both disciplines. Despite the abundance of genomic information, however, a major challenge remains for the transfer of the language of genomics into practical applications. Speeding up the translation of genomics into plant breeding programs would lead to quicker and more accurate plant breeding progress. Crop translational research in the genomics era provides opportunities to discover and develop new breeding tools and to deliver early-warning agronomy tools for crops, particularly those with limited genomic resources. Translational research can accelerate with the use of novel tools of marker-aided selection, phenotyping, and speed breeding.

This Special Issue on the “Translational Research in Plant Breeding “ invites research and review articles combining cutting-edge bioscience with innovative agronomy in crops and trees. We especially encourage submission of manuscripts that involve transdisciplinary research.

Dr. Hamid Khazaei
Prof. Rodomiro Ortiz
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Agronomy is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • Bioinformatics
  • Bioscience
  • Candidate gene
  • Crops
  • Gene editing
  • Gene expression
  • Genomics
  • Marker-assisted selection
  • Molecular breeding
  • Phenotyping
  • Plant breeding
  • Translational crop science

Published Papers (4 papers)

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Research

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17 pages, 1232 KiB  
Article
Conversion and Validation of Uniplex SNP Markers for Selection of Resistance to Cassava Mosaic Disease in Cassava Breeding Programs
by Adenike D. Ige, Bunmi Olasanmi, Edwige Gaby Nkouaya Mbanjo, Ismail S. Kayondo, Elizabeth Y. Parkes, Peter Kulakow, Chiedozie Egesi, Guillaume J. Bauchet, Enghwa Ng, Luis Augusto Becerra Lopez-Lavalle, Hernan Ceballos and Ismail Y. Rabbi
Agronomy 2021, 11(3), 420; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy11030420 - 25 Feb 2021
Cited by 6 | Viewed by 4235
Abstract
Cassava mosaic disease (CMD) is a major viral disease adversely affecting cassava production in Africa and Asia. Genomic regions conferring resistance to the disease have been mapped in African cassava germplasm through biparental quantitative trait loci (QTL) mapping and genome-wide association studies. To [...] Read more.
Cassava mosaic disease (CMD) is a major viral disease adversely affecting cassava production in Africa and Asia. Genomic regions conferring resistance to the disease have been mapped in African cassava germplasm through biparental quantitative trait loci (QTL) mapping and genome-wide association studies. To facilitate the utilization of these markers in breeding pipelines to support selections, proof-of-concept technical and biological validation research was carried out using independent pre-breeding and breeding populations. Kompetitive Allele-Specific Polymerase Chain Reaction (KASP) assays were designed from three single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) markers linked to a major resistance locus on chromosome 12 (S12_7926132, S12_7926163) and a minor locus on chromosome 14 (S14_4626854). The designed assays were robust and easy to score with >99% genotype call rate. The overall predictive accuracy (proportion of true positives and true negatives) of the markers (S12_7926132 and S14_4626854) was 0.80 and 0.78 in the pre-breeding and breeding population, respectively. On average, genotypes that carried at least one copy of the resistant allele at the major CMD2 locus had a significantly higher yield advantage. Nevertheless, variation was observed in prediction accuracies for the major locus (S12_7926132) among sub-families from the two populations, suggesting the need for context-specific utilization, for example, by screening for co-segregation of favorable SNP alleles with resistance in the parents being used for crosses. Availability of these validated SNP markers on the uniplex KASP genotyping platform represents an important step in translational genetics toward marker-assisted selection to accelerate introgression of favorable resistant alleles in breeding populations. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Translational Research in Plant Breeding)
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16 pages, 6257 KiB  
Article
Differential Gene Expression Analysis of Wheat Breeding Lines Reveal Molecular Insights in Yellow Rust Resistance under Field Conditions
by Sandeep Kumar Kushwaha, Ramesh R. Vetukuri, Firuz Odilbekov, Nidhi Pareek, Tina Henriksson and Aakash Chawade
Agronomy 2020, 10(12), 1888; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy10121888 - 29 Nov 2020
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 4709
Abstract
The evolution of pathogens in the changing climate raises new challenges for wheat production. Yellow rust is one of the major wheat diseases worldwide, leading to an increased use of fungicides to prevent significant yield losses. The enhancement of the resistance potential of [...] Read more.
The evolution of pathogens in the changing climate raises new challenges for wheat production. Yellow rust is one of the major wheat diseases worldwide, leading to an increased use of fungicides to prevent significant yield losses. The enhancement of the resistance potential of wheat cultivars is a necessary and environmentally friendly solution for sustainable wheat production. In this study, we aimed to identify the differentially expressed genes induced upon yellow rust infection in the field. Reference and de novo based transcriptome analysis was performed among the resistant and susceptible lines of a bi-parental population to study the global transcriptome changes in contrasting wheat genotypes. Based on the analysis, the de novo transcriptome analysis approach was found to be more supportive for field studies. Expression profiles, gene ontology, KEGG pathway analysis and enrichment studies indicated the relation between differentially expressed genes of wheat and yellow rust infection. The h0igh expression of genes related to non-race specific resistance along with pathogen-specific resistance might be a reason for the better resistance ability of a resistant wheat genotype in the field. The targeted metagenomic analysis of wheat samples revealed that Puccinia striiformis tritici was the most dominant pathogen along with other pathogens on the collected leaf material and validating the disease scoring carried out in the field and transcriptomics analyses. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Translational Research in Plant Breeding)
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15 pages, 5928 KiB  
Article
Affordable Phenotyping of Winter Wheat under Field and Controlled Conditions for Drought Tolerance
by Dhananjay Kumar, Sandeep Kushwaha, Chiara Delvento, Žilvinas Liatukas, Vivekanand Vivekanand, Jan T. Svensson, Tina Henriksson, Gintaras Brazauskas and Aakash Chawade
Agronomy 2020, 10(6), 882; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy10060882 - 19 Jun 2020
Cited by 22 | Viewed by 6874
Abstract
Drought stress is one of the key plant stresses reducing grain yield in cereal crops worldwide. Although it is not a breeding target in Northern Europe, the changing climate and the drought of 2018 have increased its significance in the region. A key [...] Read more.
Drought stress is one of the key plant stresses reducing grain yield in cereal crops worldwide. Although it is not a breeding target in Northern Europe, the changing climate and the drought of 2018 have increased its significance in the region. A key challenge, therefore, is to identify novel germplasm with higher drought tolerance, a task that will require continuous characterization of a large number of genotypes. The aim of this work was to assess if phenotyping systems with low-cost consumer-grade digital cameras can be used to characterize germplasm for drought tolerance. To achieve this goal, we built a proximal phenotyping cart mounted with digital cameras and evaluated it by characterizing 142 winter wheat genotypes for drought tolerance under field conditions. The same genotypes were additionally characterized for seedling stage traits by imaging under controlled growth conditions. The analysis revealed that under field conditions, plant biomass, relative growth rates, and Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) from different growth stages estimated by imaging were significantly correlated to drought tolerance. Under controlled growth conditions, root count at the seedling stage evaluated by imaging was significantly correlated to adult plant drought tolerance observed in the field. Random forest models were trained by integrating measurements from field and controlled conditions and revealed that plant biomass and relative growth rates at key plant growth stages are important predictors of drought tolerance. Thus, based on the results, it can be concluded that the consumer-grade cameras can be key components of affordable automated phenotyping systems to accelerate pre-breeding for drought tolerance. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Translational Research in Plant Breeding)
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Review

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19 pages, 1319 KiB  
Review
Physiological and Biochemical Basis of Faba Bean Breeding for Drought Adaptation—A Review
by Md Abdul Muktadir, Kedar Nath Adhikari, Andrew Merchant, Kiflemariam Y. Belachew, Albert Vandenberg, Frederick L. Stoddard and Hamid Khazaei
Agronomy 2020, 10(9), 1345; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy10091345 - 07 Sep 2020
Cited by 28 | Viewed by 6570
Abstract
Grain legumes are commonly used for food and feed all over the world and are the main source of protein for over a billion people worldwide, but their production is at risk from climate change. Water deficit and heat stress both significantly reduce [...] Read more.
Grain legumes are commonly used for food and feed all over the world and are the main source of protein for over a billion people worldwide, but their production is at risk from climate change. Water deficit and heat stress both significantly reduce the yield of grain legumes, and the faba bean is considered particularly susceptible. The genetic improvement of faba bean for drought adaptation (water deficit tolerance) by conventional methods and molecular breeding is time-consuming and laborious, since it depends mainly on selection and adaptation in multiple sites. The lack of high-throughput screening methodology and low heritability of advantageous traits under environmental stress challenge breeding progress. Alternatively, selection based on secondary characters in a controlled environment followed by field trials is successful in some crops, including faba beans. In general, measured features related to drought adaptation are shoot and root morphology, stomatal characteristics, osmotic adjustment and the efficiency of water use. Here, we focus on the current knowledge of biochemical and physiological markers for legume improvement that can be incorporated into faba bean breeding programs for drought adaptation. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Translational Research in Plant Breeding)
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