Hybrid Breeding: Future Status and Future Prospects - Series II

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

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (25 October 2022) | Viewed by 8219

Special Issue Editors


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School of Agricultural Sciences, University of Western Macedonia, 9 Iraklias str., 54636 Thessaloniki, Hellas, Greece
Interests: plant breeding; field experimentation; cytogenetics; doubled haploid production (anther culture and wide hybridization); study of the 1RL.1RS wheat-rye chromosome translocation; wheat (bread and durum) rye; triticale and cotton
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Guest Editor
Department of Plant Genetics & Breeding, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Thessaloniki, Greece
Interests: plant genetics & breeding; molecular cytogenetics; breeding for resistance to abiotic stress conditions and food quality
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Guest Editor
Institute of Plant Breeding and Genetic Resources, Hellenic Agricultural Organization–"Demeter", 57001 Thessaloniki, Greece
Interests: cereal genetics and breeding; plant genetic resources; diversity; multi-environment field evaluation; tolerance to abiotic stress; GxE interaction; wide and specific agronomic adaptation; responsiveness to inputs; climate change
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Hybrid breeding is a scientific approach based on the exploitation of heterosis for crop production. The use of hybrids changed the history of agriculture since some crops increased the yield potential and its stability of production significantly in adverse environments. Nowadays, its importance remains relevant due to the prevalence of climate change and environmental deterioration. The discovery of cytoplasmic male sterility (CMS) facilitated the introgression of hybrid breeding in some cross-pollinated and self-pollinated crop species like wheat, rye, barley, tomato, etc., enabling the production of high yielding hybrids, whereas in other cases hybridization enabled the production of new cultivars (e.g. via transferring useful translocations like the 1BL.1RS and 1AL.1RS in bread wheat) or even crops (e.g. triticate, tritordeum, hordocale). Another important application of heterosis is the production of doubled haploid lines after crossing recalcitrant wheat cultivars to cultivars with good andogenic ability. Thus it is crucial to study the effect of heterosis on important crop species, where pure lines are still the dominant type of cultivars. However, attention must be given to avoid side effects noticed after applying CMS procedure in hybrid breeding. New sources of CMS and restoration genes have to be discovered to ensure the conservation and broadening of the genetic background for crop plants. Furthermore, the latest achievements of molecular techniques could be proved beneficial in hybrid breeding. This new special issue aims to provide all current prospects regarding a safe and effective application of hybrid breeding for the benefit of farmers, consumers, and seed companies.

Dr. Ioannis N. Xynias
Dr. Athanasios G. Mavromatis
Dr. Ioannis Mylonas
Guest Editors

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Keywords

  • heterosis
  • combining ability
  • cytoplasmic male sterility
  • restoration genes
  • food safety

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Published Papers (3 papers)

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Research

11 pages, 514 KiB  
Article
Evaluation of Advanced Mutant Restorer Lines for Enhancing Outcrossing Rate and Hybrid Seed Production of Diverse Rice Cytoplasmic Male Sterile Lines
by Hassan Sh. Hamad, Mohamed I. Ghazy, Eman M. Bleih, Elsayed E. Gewaily, Mahmoud M. Gaballah, Mesfer M. Alqahtani, Fatmah A. Safhi, Salha M. ALshamrani and Elsayed Mansour
Agronomy 2022, 12(11), 2875; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy12112875 - 17 Nov 2022
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1528
Abstract
Hybrid rice seed production predominantly relies on the pollen ability of restorer lines and the stigma properties of the cytoplasmic male sterile (CMS) lines. Improving the pollen ability and agronomic performance of restorer lines could be achieved using mutation to reinforce the outcrossing [...] Read more.
Hybrid rice seed production predominantly relies on the pollen ability of restorer lines and the stigma properties of the cytoplasmic male sterile (CMS) lines. Improving the pollen ability and agronomic performance of restorer lines could be achieved using mutation to reinforce the outcrossing rate and seed set percentage of CMS lines. Two commercial restorer cultivars (Giza-178 and Giza-179) were treated with three different doses of gamma-ray; 200, 300, and 400 Gy. The derived mutant restorer lines were selfed and constantly evaluated with their corresponding parental cultivars until the M6 generation. Six promising mutant lines were chosen based on their performance to be evaluated with their parents for their pollen and agronomic characteristics. The novel-induced mutant restorer lines exhibited significant differences in all studied pollen and agronomic characteristics. The mutant restorer lines R4 and R7 exhibited superior desirable anther length (2.36 and 2.38 mm, in the same order), anther width (0.47 and 0.45 mm), pollen fertility (97.50 and 97.31%), basal pore length (218.8 and 299.5 mm), apical length (103.6 and 108.1), number of pollen grains per anther (1810 and 1832), plant height (121.8 and 115.9 cm), fertile tillers (23.50 and 18.89), number of spikelets per panicle (203.2 and 202.5), panicle length (25.34 and 24.26 cm), number of filled grains per panicle (195.5 and 191.8), seed set percentage (95.56 and 96.63%), and grain yield (11.01 and 11.36 t/ha). Based on the results of the first two seasons, the two novel promising restorers and their parental cultivars were crossed with four diverse CMS lines. The seed set percentage and hybrid seed production of the crossed CMS lines were evaluated for further two seasons. The results exposed that the combinations derived from restorer lines R4 and R7 with most of the evaluated CMS lines produced the uppermost seed set percentage outcrossing rate. Particularly in combination with CMS2, the restorer lines R4 and R7 displayed the highest seed set percentage (39.57 and 34.80%), number of tillers fertile per hill (25.31 and 23.32), seed yield (2.02 and 1.81 t/ha), and harvest index (23.88 and 22.66%). Conclusively, the derived gamma-ray-induced mutant restorer lines R4 and R7 could be exploited as a new source for ensuring desirable pollen and anther characteristics in order to improve the outcrossing rate of CMS lines and hybrid rice seed production. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Hybrid Breeding: Future Status and Future Prospects - Series II)
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19 pages, 1740 KiB  
Article
Combining Ability Analysis and Marker-Based Prediction of Heterosis in Yield Reveal Prominent Heterotic Combinations from Diallel Population of Rice
by Md. Mobinur Rahman, Umakanta Sarker, Md Ahsanul Haque Swapan, Mohammad Sharif Raihan, Shinya Oba, Saud Alamri and Manzer H. Siddiqui
Agronomy 2022, 12(8), 1797; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy12081797 - 29 Jul 2022
Cited by 21 | Viewed by 2581
Abstract
Combining ability along with heterosis was elucidated in the 21 F1 hybrid population of rice derived from a 7 × 7 diallel mating design. Furthermore, to formulate a strategy for marker-based prediction of heterosis, the molecular genetic diversity (GD) was then surveyed [...] Read more.
Combining ability along with heterosis was elucidated in the 21 F1 hybrid population of rice derived from a 7 × 7 diallel mating design. Furthermore, to formulate a strategy for marker-based prediction of heterosis, the molecular genetic diversity (GD) was then surveyed among the seven parental lines with RAPD markers. Analysis of combining ability revealed significant GCA and SCA variances and the ratio between the aforesaid genetic parameter was more than unity for most of the traits signifying the preponderance of additive gene action. Hybrid combination Double Rice × Pokkali was the best specific combiner for the traits pollen fertility percentage (%), panicle length (cm), filled grains/panicle (no.) and grain yield/hill (g) while Muktagacha × BRRI dhan29 and Basmati × Double Rice were the best specific combiners for grain length (mm) and 1000-grain weight (g), respectively. Regarding the magnitude of heterosis, Double Rice × Pokkali exhibited maximum heterobeltiosis for panicle length (33.33%) and the number of filled grains/panicle (144.01%). Furthermore, Pokkali × Chinigura was verified for producing the highest heterobeltiosis for tillers/hill (173.17%), as well as grain yield/hill (71.05%). The heatmap relying on molecular genetic diversity exposed the highest genetic distance between Chinigura and Pokkali followed by Muktagacha and Pokkali. Unweighted neighbor-joining trees clustered the parental lines into three groups indicating the presence of considerable genetic diversity among those seven parental genotypes. A positive and significant correlation was explored between molecular GD with specific combining ability as well as heterosis for all of the traits revealing the huge potentiality of hybrid performance prediction using RAPD markers with the present set of individuals. Thus, exploration of definite genomic regions underlying the candidate genes for respective traits relying on such RAPD-generated data following an advanced molecular marker approach would pave the path of mining out yielder heterotic combinations. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Hybrid Breeding: Future Status and Future Prospects - Series II)
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23 pages, 303 KiB  
Article
Evaluation of Combining Ability and Heterosis of Popular Restorer and Male Sterile Lines for the Development of Superior Rice Hybrids
by Abul Kalam Azad, Umakanta Sarker, Sezai Ercisli, Amine Assouguem, Riaz Ullah, Rafa Almeer, Amany A. Sayed and Ilaria Peluso
Agronomy 2022, 12(4), 965; https://doi.org/10.3390/agronomy12040965 - 16 Apr 2022
Cited by 34 | Viewed by 3190
Abstract
Twenty-four hybrids, obtained from a mating design following 6 line × 4 testers, were evaluated to estimate the heterosis, specific, and general combining ability (SCA and GCA) of parents and hybrids to find out suitable general combiner (GC) parents and cross combinations for [...] Read more.
Twenty-four hybrids, obtained from a mating design following 6 line × 4 testers, were evaluated to estimate the heterosis, specific, and general combining ability (SCA and GCA) of parents and hybrids to find out suitable general combiner (GC) parents and cross combinations for utilization in the future breeding program. A randomized complete block design with three replications was followed to set the experiment. Data were recorded on grain yield and 13 yield-related agronomic traits. The analysis of variance of all cross combinations had highly significant differences for most of the characters studied, which indicated a wide variation across the genotypes, parents, lines, testers, and crosses. SCA and GCA variances were significant for all studied traits except for the panicle length, indicating that both non-additive and additive gene actions were involved in these traits. The GCA variance/SCA variance for all the traits was <1, signifying the multitude of dominant and epistatic gene actions. The GCA effects of three lines GAN46A, IR58025A, IR62629A, and a tester IR46R were significant for the majority of the agronomic traits including grain yield and might be used for improving the yield of grains in rice as parents of excellent GC. Based on the yield of grains and agronomic traits, the hybrids IR58025A × IR46R and GAN46A × IR46R might be considered the best hybrids and another nine hybrids could also be considered good hybrids. Similarly, based on the yield of grains and agronomic traits, the positive and significant mid-parent, better parent, and standard heterosis were obtained from 3 F1s, 1 F1, and 3 F1s, respectively. Heterosis and combining ability study revealed that hybrids IR58025A × IR46R and GAN46A × IR46R might be considered preferable hybrid cultivars. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Hybrid Breeding: Future Status and Future Prospects - Series II)
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