Drought Stress Tolerance in Wheat and Barley: Advances in Physiology, Breeding and Genetics Research

Abstract

Climate change is a major threat to most of the agricultural crops grown in tropical and sub-tropical areas globally. Drought stress is one of the consequences of climate change that has a negative impact on crop growth and yield. In the past, many simulation models were proposed to predict climate change and drought occurrences, and it is extremely important to improve essential crops to meet the challenges of drought stress which limits crop productivity and production. Wheat and barley are among the most common and widely used crops due to their economic and social values. Many parts of the world depend on these two crops for food and feed, and both crops are vulnerable to drought stress. Improving drought stress tolerance is a very challenging task for wheat and barley researchers and more research is needed to better understand this stress. The progress made in understanding drought tolerance is due to advances in three main research areas: physiology, breeding, and genetic research. The physiology research focused on the physiological and biochemical metabolic pathways that plants use when exposed to drought stress. New wheat and barley genotypes having a high degree of drought tolerance are produced through breeding by making crosses from promising drought-tolerant genotypes and selecting among their progeny. Also, identifying genes contributing to drought tolerance is very important. Previous studies showed that drought tolerance is a polygenic trait and genetic constitution will help to dissect the gene network(s) controlling drought tolerance. This review explores the recent advances in these three research areas to improve drought tolerance in wheat and barley.

Impact of synthesized metal oxide nanomaterials on seedlings production of three Solanaceae crops

“…Recently, the plant breeders have become astonishing in nanoagriculture via the utilization of nanoparticles which may exert benefits to the crops as well as providing tolerance to various biotic and abiotic factors (Sallam et al, 2019). As scientific investigations on nanoparticles are still in its rudimentary stage and the majority of nanoparticles-related germination experiments were based on priming technique as well as demonstration phytotoxic impacts of nanoparticles at the seedling stage.…”

Phenolic Metabolites from Barley in Contribution to Phenome in soil Moisture Deficit

“…This allows to minimize the detrimental effect of this stress and increase the likelihood of obtaining some crop yield despite a permanent or temporary water deficit. Resistance to this stress in its physiological context is determined by “drought escape”, “dehydration avoidance” and/or “dehydration tolerance” [ 4 ].…”

A Dual Strategy of Breeding for Drought Tolerance and Introducing Drought-Tolerant, Underutilized Crops into Production Systems to Enhance Their Resilience to Water Deficiency

“…For the development of genetic materials with drought tolerance, selection has focused on genotypes with high yield levels cultivated under dry conditions. For example, in wheat and maize, selections have been based on evaluating the plant phenotypes and physiological responses to drought stress [ 94 ]. Selection based on plant responses to drought stress is affected by low heritability, genetic interaction, environment-genotype interactions, and polygenic effects; therefore, the selection is slow, as massive phenotypic screening is required [ 95 ].…”