Harnessing Crop Diversity through Genetics, Genomics and Phenomics Approaches

Dear Colleagues,

Feeding the world is the main challenge that agriculture will have to address in the next decades for ensuring food security in the scenario of climate change and global demographic growth. In the past 50 years, tremendous efforts have been undertaken toward the establishment of strategies for crop conservation and management. This has led to the establishment of germplasm repositories able to maintain and reproduce, ex situ and in situ, millions of accessions for thousands of existing plant species. This largely untapped biodiversity represents one of the key elements for accelerating the identification of new sources of variation able to enhance the productivity and resilience ability of crops. Several technologies in the field of biology provide the opportunity for deep investigation of genetic resources at different depth scales, facilitating an understanding of mechanisms regulating the complex basis of traits and discovering of novel alleles for breeding programs.

This Special Issue will positively consider original research, reviews, communications, opinions, perspectives, and technology reports, based on advances in the exploration of germplasm diversity through genetic (molecular markers), genomics (cutting edge sequencing-based platforms), and phenomics (metabolomics, sensors, phenotyping platforms) approaches. Research focusing on genome wide association studies and QTL mapping, as well as the exploitation of primary, secondary, and tertiary genetic pool by development and phenotyping of: i) interspecific and intergeneric hybrids (using different techniques, e.g., sexual crosses, embryo rescue, bridge crosses); ii) bi-parental mapping populations such as introgression lines, backcross inbred lines, and recombinant inbred lines; and iii) multi-parental mapping populations such as MAGIC or NAM will be welcome. Phenotyping of core collection, miscellaneous stocks, etc., across multilocation trials towards an understanding of genotypic and environmental factors underlying the variation of traits will be within the general scope of this Special Issue.

Dr. Pasquale Tripodi
Guest Editor

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