Accelerate plant breeding through molecular methods
The science of breeding plants has been known for ages. And now when it’s the era of New Generation Sequencing techniques, advanced methodologies have been developed for breeding plants. One such way is using assisted markers in the process of the generation of plant breeds. These groundbreaking technologies are on the verge of efficiently improving the production of desired plants.
Remarkable progress can be seen in the agriculture sector where the high demand for improved crop yields has shed light on the new approaches to plant breeding. All made possible through plant breeding along with the subsequent development of “agrochemicals”. However, the conventional plant breeding process utilizes a vast amount of time in the process of identifying the breeds which express the desirable trait. This amount can be drastically reduced if the desired trait is selected beforehand and then expressed [1].
One of the foremost challenges a plant breeder faces is the effective selection of the breeds and effectively increasing the breeding for a sustainable future. However, Marker Assisted Breeding has proved to be a powerful tool for improving plant varieties. Plant breeders have subsequently shifted themselves towards the marker assisted way of breeding through the enormous benefits provided by the method. For example, in conventional methods, for the generation of nematode resistance plant breeds, the plants are initially inoculated with the nematode eggs. The process is then followed through the rigorous counting of the number of nematodes present. Breeding plants through identification of the selective markers proves to be advantageous as it can eventually reduce the cost and labor-intensive tasks.
The generation of sequencing data from the low-cost solution of sequencing platforms, has led to the selection of genes associated with the desired trait or genes located near the gene of interest. Mostly defined as DNA markers, these genes are a vital part of the breeding technologies. Of the varied categories of markers, the most widely used in plant breeding is the simple sequence repeats (SSR) and single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNP) [2].
Applications of Marker Assisted breeding can be broadened up to a wide range as more and more countries are shifting towards sustainable ways of food and plant generation. One of the applications of this technique can be seen in the identification of the pure breed of plants such as “hybrid rice” [3]. Other scenarios can be observed where markers resistance against vial plant pathogens can be selected. Also, as can be seen, the future of plants lies in the next generation of marker-assisted breeding thereby providing the world with enough energy.
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References
- He, J., Zhao, X., Laroche, A., Lu, Z. X., Liu, H., & Li, Z. (2014). Genotyping-by-sequencing (GBS), an ultimate marker-assisted selection (MAS) tool to accelerate plant breeding. Frontiers in plant science, 5, 484.
- Vlk, D., & Řepková, J. (2017). Application of next-generation sequencing in plant breeding. Czech Journal of Genetics and Plant Breeding, 53(3), 89-96.
- Hasan, N., Choudhary, S., Naaz, N., Sharma, N., & Laskar, R. A. (2021). Recent advancements in molecular marker-assisted selection and applications in plant breeding programmes. Journal of Genetic Engineering and Biotechnology, 19(1), 1-26.