Plant Genetic Resources

The section Plant Genetic Resources invites all researchers and stakeholders in this field to publish original research, reviews, and short communications on all aspects of plant genetic resources research to advance our knowledge of the conservation and utilization of plant genetic resources. Plant genetic resources can be broadly defined as any plant material containing functional units of heredity with current or potential future economic, scientific, or societal value, particularly with regard to food, agriculture, medicine, and ecological services. They include cultivated plants, landraces, and crop wild relatives that are of special interest for plant breeding to broaden the genetic basis of future cultivars, edible wild plants, medicinal and aromatic plants, horticultural plants, plants for forage and ecological services, and forest trees. These resources also include valuable materials used in ethnobotanical, evolutionary, taxonomical, ecological, molecular, genetic, physiological, biochemical, nutraceutical, pathological, or pharmacological research.

In particular, but not exclusively, this section welcomes manuscripts featuring outstanding research on the following broad themes:

• Plant diversity and evolution;
• Plant domestication and crop evolution;
• Plant and society;
• Crops and crop wild relatives;
• Neglected and underutilized plant species;
• Horticultural, medicinal, aromatic and edible wild plants;
• Plants for forage and ecological services and forest trees;
• Ex situ, in situ, and on-farm conservation and management;
• Genebank management;
• Germplasm documentation and database management;
• Digital sequence information for plant genetic resources;
• Seed science and technology for germplasm conservation;
• Technical advances in germplasm conservation and use;
• Genebank genomics and phenomics;
• Germplasm enhancement and adaptation to climate change;
• Germplasm access and benefit-sharing;
• Indigenous knowledge on plant genetic resources;
• Economic aspects of plant germplasm conservation and use;
• Policies and strategies for plant genetic resource conservation and use.