Utilization of “hidden genes” from wild species has emerged as a novel option for enrichment of genetic diversity for productivity traits. In rice we have generated more than 2000 lines having introgression from ‘A’ genome-donor wild species of rice in the genetic background of popular varieties PR114 and Pusa44 were developed. Out of these, based on agronomic acceptability, 318 lines were used for developing rice hybrids to assess the effect of introgressions in heterozygous state. These introgression lines and their recurrent parents, possessing fertility restoration ability for wild abortive (WA) cytoplasm, were crossed with cytoplasmic male sterile (CMS) line PMS17A to develop hybrids. Hybrids developed from recurrent parents were used as checks to compare the performance of 318 hybrids developed by hybridizing alien introgression lines with PMS17A. Seventeen hybrids expressed a significant increase in yield and its component traits over check hybrids. These 17 hybrids were re-evaluated in large-size replicated plots. Of these, four hybrids, viz., ILH299, ILH326, ILH867 and ILH901, having introgressions from O. rufipogon and two hybrids (ILH921 and ILH951) having introgressions from O. nivara showed significant heterosis over parental introgression line, recurrent parents and check hybrids for grain yield-related traits. Alien introgressions were detected in the lines taken as male parents for developing six superior hybrids, using a set of 100 polymorphic simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers. Percent introgression showed a range of 2.24 from in O. nivara to 7.66 from O. rufipogon. The introgressed regions and their putative association with yield components in hybrids is reported and discussed.

research strategies galvanized to control the wheat killer genus Puccinia. It will also highlight the outcome and research impact of cost-effective NGS technologies and cloning of rust resistance genes amid the public availability of common and tetraploid wheat reference genomes.

Nutritional stress is making over two billion world population malnourished. Either our commercially cultivated varieties of cereals, pulses, and oilseed crops are deficient in essential nutrients or the soils in which these crops grow are becoming devoid of minerals. Unfortunately, our major food crops are poor sources of micronutrients required for normal human growth. To overcome the problem of nutritional deficiency, greater emphasis should be laid on the identification of genes/quantitative trait loci (QTLs) pertaining to essential nutrients and their successful deployment in elite breeding lines through marker-assisted breeding. The manuscript deals with information on identified QTLs for protein content, vitamins, macronutrients, micro-nutrients, minerals, oil content, and essential amino acids in major food crops. These QTLs can be utilized in the development of nutrient-rich crop varieties. Genome editing technologies that can rapidly modify genomes in a precise way and will directly enrich the nutritional status of elite varieties could hold a bright future to address the challenge of malnutrition.

We document here the presence of a recombinant plastome in a cytoplasmic male sterile (CMS) line of Brassica juncea developed from the somatic hybrid Trachystoma ballii + B. juncea. Restriction endonuclease digestion of the chloroplast (cp) DNA has revealed that the recombinant plastome gives rise to novel fragments in addition to the parent-specific fragments. Analysis of the 16S rRNA region by Southern hybridization shows no variation between B. juncea, T. ballii and the CMS line. The rbcL gene region of the recombinant plastome is identical to that in T. ballii. Analysis with probes for psbA and psbD using single and double DNA digests indicates that the hybridization patterns of the recombinant plastome are identical to those of the parents in digests obtained with some restriction enzymes, while novel bands hybridize to probes in other digests. In the psbA region, a B. juncea-specific PstI site and a T. ballii-specific EcoRI site are found in the recombinant plastome. The pshD region of the recombinant plastome contains a B. juncea-specific HindIII site and T. ballii-specific BamHI and HpaII sites. These results indicate the occurrence of intergenomic recombination between the chloroplasts of T. ballii and B. juncea in the somatic hybrid from which the CMS line was developed. The recombined plastome appears to be a mosaic of fragments specific to both parents and the recombination event has occurred in the single-copy regions. These recombinational events have not caused any imbalance in the recombinant plastome in terms of chloroplast-related functions, which have remained stable over generations.

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Rice is one of the most important crops in the world. The wild species of rice are expected to have novel beneficial alleles that have been lost from cultivated rice during the process of domestication. Therefore, wild species could be the potential source to induce lost genetic diversity in cultivated rice. Serving as an important reservoir of novel genes/QTLs, wild species, in general, are better adapted to different ecologies and can tolerate many biotic and abiotic stresses. Despite that, only a few wild species are studied and extensive characterization both at the molecular and morphological level is yet to be achieved. Several agronomically important genes/QTLs for improving biotic and abiotic stresses, resistance, productivity and grain quality traits were identified from AA genome donor wild species and were tagged with breeder friendly molecular markers for their transfer to elite genetic backgrounds. The present review provides information on the important wild rice species harbouring genes/QTLs for agriculturally important traits and their successful utilization in rice breeding programmes.

Knowledge about the yield gain over the years due to associated changes in the yield component traits is essential for a critical understanding of yield-limiting factors. To estimate genetic gain in grain yield (GY) and component agronomic traits of wheat varieties released between 1900 and 2016 for northwestern plain zone (NWPZ) of India and to identify agronomic and/or genetic basis of the realized gains, two sets of wheat varieties comprising mega varieties and two recently developed varieties were evaluated under timely sown, tilled, and early sown conservation agriculture (CA) conditions for four consecutive years under irrigated conditions. The average annual genetic gain in GY since 1,905 under timely sown irrigated conditions was found to be 0.544% yr−1 over the average of all varieties and 0.822% yr−1 (24.27 kg ha−1 yr−1) over the first released variety, NP4. The realized mean yield increased from 2,950 kg ha−1 of the variety NP4 released in 1,905–5,649 kg ha−1 of HD3086 released in 2014. Regression analysis revealed a linear reduction in height and peduncle length (PL) over the years with a simultaneous and linear increase in biomass at the rate of 43.9 kg ha−1 yr−1 or relatively at 0.368% yr−1 mainly because of delayed heading and increased crop duration. Regression analysis showed no linear trend for tiller number and thousand-grain weight (TGW). Though harvest index (HI) was found to linearly increase relatively at the rate of 0.198% per annum, polynomial regression improved the fitness of data with the indication of no increase in HI since 1982. Interestingly, genetic gain evaluation under early sown CA conditions for 4 years showed similar relative gain (RG) [a relative improvement in varieties across breeding periods (BP)] (0.544% yr−1) but with a higher absolute value (29.28 kg ha−1 yr−1). Major mega varieties like Kalyan Sona, HD2009, PBW 343, HD2967, and HD3086, which occupied a comparatively larger area, were found highly plastic to the improvements in the production environment under timely sown conditions.

A high yielding bread wheat variety HI 1628 (Pusa Wheat 1628) has been released and notified by the Central Sub-Committee on Crop Standards, Notification and Release of Varieties for Agricultural Crops, Government of India for commercial cultivation under timely sown, restricted irrigated conditions of North Western Plains Zone (NWPZ) of the country. HI 1628 has an average yield of 50.4 q/ha over the zone and showed significant superiority over the checks; with a potential yield of 65.1 q/ha. It has shown an excellent and wider adaptation and significantly superior performance across different irrigation regimes over the checks with an average yield of 45.5 q/ha. It showed high levels of field resistance to stripe and leaf rusts. It is a good quality bread wheat genotype with excellent chapati quality (7.56), bread quality (7.64), biscuit spread factor (8.27) and high sedimentation value (56.6 ml). It has high protein content (~11 %) and protein quality (Glu score of 8/10) for high molecular weight subunits and presence of 5+10 subunit of Glu-D1 reflecting higher gluten strength in the genotype. It has good levels of essential micronutrients like iron and zinc making it rich in nutritional qualities. This variety has promise for timely sown, restricted irrigation planting areas and thus will contribute to increase wheat production and will alleviate the socio-economic status of farmers of NWPZ of India.