Advances in Research for Legume Breeding and Genetics

Dear Colleagues, 

Legumes (family Fabaceae) comprise a large family of plants grown worldwide, which are second in importance after cereals for human consumption and animal feed. Legumes are an important source of dietary protein, particularly in developing countries, where products from legumes are highly nutritious for these vulnerable populations. Therefore, legumes represent a solution for global food and nutritional security. In addition to food and fodder uses, legumes have the ability to fix nitrogen, which decreases the need for application of N-fertilizers, making them economically profitable and sustainable crop species. Legumes include well-known crops such as bean (Phaseolus vulgaris), soybean (Glycine max), peanut (Arachis hypogaea), pea (Pisum sativum), chickpea (Cicer arietinum), broad bean (Vicia faba), pigeonpea (Cajanus cajan), cowpea (Vigna unguiculata), and lentils (Lens culinaris), among others. In comparison with cereal crops, legumes have not been a research priority and improvements in yield unfortunately continue at a slow pace. Major constraints for legume production and quality include biotic pressure (pest and diseases) and abiotic stresses (heat, frost, drought, and salinity). In addition to this, for some legumes species such as peanut, chickpea, and pigeonpea, as a consequence of their origin, evolution, and domestication, their narrow genetic base has tremendously decreased their ability to withstand biotic and abiotic stresses. The objective of this Special Issue of Plants is to collate original research articles that describe recent advancements in the breeding, genetics, and genomics of legume crops. Specifically, we would like to highlight efforts toward the development of improved high-yield varieties harboring resistance or tolerance to biotic and abiotic stresses by including topics such as exploration and use of germplasms to broaden genetic bases, pre-breeding, trait discovery, mapping of qualitative and quantitative traits, genetics analysis, cytogenetics, epigenetics, marker-assisted breeding, genomics, and the integration of new technologies and strategies into mapping and breeding workflows.

Dr. Carolina Ballen Taborda
Dr. Sergio Sebastian Samoluk
Dr. Maricel Podio
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2700 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• legume breeding
• genetic diversity
• germplasm
• trait discovery and mapping
• genetics
• cytogenetics
• epigenetics
• genomics and bioinformatics
• molecular breeding
• marker-assisted breeding
• disease resistance
• tolerance to abiotic stresses
• cover crops