Institutional Publications

Permanent URI for this collectionhttps://ndkr-library.nipgr.ac.in/handle/123456789/11

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Author: search.filters.author.Prasad, ManojSubject: search.filters.subject.Food security

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    The promise of millets in the twenty-first century: emphasis on breeding, nutrition, food security and sustainability
    (Springer Nature Publishing AG, 2023) Bandyopadhyay, Tirthankar; Singh, Roshan Kumar; Ramesh, Palakurthi; Maurya, Jyoti; Prasad, Manoj
    Global population is expected to cross 11 billion by the turn of the century, which has put immense pressure on the existing agricultural systems worldwide. This is complicated by gradually decreasing productivity and acreage as a result of climate change in addition to ever-increasing input costs of resource hungry staple crops like rice, wheat, and maize. Unfortunately, the most affected by these events are those who have the least resources at their disposal to mitigate the issue, especially in countries of Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. It is therefore pertinent to explore and adopt alternative and/or complementary crops that are easier to cultivate, climate change tolerant, less resource hungry, nutritionally richer for human consumption, and agriculturally sustainable. Millets are perfect cereal crops which meet all of these requirements and can realistically provide much-needed solutions to current global food and nutritional security challenges. In this review, we provide a bird’s eye view of the relevance of millets in global agro-ecosystems in the context of their nutritional and agronomic attributes. Furthermore, we share perspectives on the major areas of crop improvement programs worldwide and discuss major challenges confronting the same. Finally, we discourse on the scope of millets for wider acceptability and highlight major points at the interface of genetic intervention–crop management post-harvest practices worth considering to potentially facilitate robust millet-based nutritional and food security.
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    Recent advancements and future perspectives of foxtail millet genomics
    (Springer Nature Publishing AG, 2023) Panchal, Anurag; Singh, Roshan Kumar; Prasad, Manoj
    One of the oldest domesticated crops, foxtail millet (Setaria italica (L.) P. Beauv.) is known for its enormous seed production and ability to grow in unfavourable agro-economic conditions. This understudied diploid panicoid crop plant which performs C4 type of photosynthesis, contains approximately seven folds higher proteins with macro and micro-nutrients as compared to major cereals including rice and wheat. Encompassing a small genome size of ~ 515 Mb, short life cycle, and inbred properties make this orphan crop a potential model system to study abiotic stress tolerance mechanisms adopted by plants. Rich phenotypic variation and the largest available germplasm collection of cultivated and wild species exists for foxtail millet. Release of whole genome sequence in 2012, led to acceleration of functional genomic studies and molecular characterization of Setaria genes conferring stress tolerance. Recent advancements in integrative OMICS and NGS approaches are contributing in functional analysis, understanding complex gene regulatory networks and molecular mechanisms behind its growth and development. Abiotic stress tolerance traits of foxtail millet including drought, salinity, and its survival in nutrient-poor soil can be introduced in popular crop plants by genetic engineering techniques. Stable plant transformation system and precise gene editing in foxtail millet are under optimization which can revolutionize the theme of climate resilient future crops. Overall, foxtail millet has characteristics to serve as an excellent C4 model plant to study evolution, stress physiology and biomass production for bioenergy crops to serve sustainable global food security in near future.
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    GWAS identifies genetic loci underlying nitrogen responsiveness in the climate resilient C4 model Setaria italica (L.)
    (Elsevier B.V., 2022) Bandyopadhyay, Tirthankar; Swarbreck, Stéphanie M; Jaiswal, Vandana; Maurya, Jyoti; Gupta, Rajeev; Bentley, Alison R.; Griffiths, Howard; Prasad, Manoj
    Introduction N responsiveness is the capacity to perceive and induce morpho-physiological adaptation to external and internal Nitrogen (N). Crop productivity is propelled by N fertilizer and requires the breeding/selection of cultivars with intrinsically high N responsiveness. This trait has many advantages in being more meaningful in commercial/environmental context, facilitating in-season N management and not being inversely correlated with N availability over processes regulating NUE. Current lack of its understanding at the physio-genetic basis is an impediment to select for cultivars with a predictably high N response. Objectives To dissect physio-genetic basis of N responsiveness in 142 diverse population of foxtail millet, Setaria italica (L.) by employing contrasting N fertilizer nutrition regimes. Methods We phenotyped S. italica accessions for major yield related traits under low (N10, N25) and optimal (N100) growth conditions and genotyped them to subsequently perform a genome-wide association study to identify genetic loci associated with nitrogen responsiveness trait. Groups of accessions showing contrasting trait performance and allelic forms of specific linked genetic loci (showing haplotypes) were further accessed for N dependent transcript abundances of their proximal genes. Results Our study show that N dependent yield rise in S. italica is driven by grain number whose responsiveness to N availability is genetically underlined. We identify 22 unique SNP loci strongly associated with this trait out of which six exhibit haplotypes and consistent allelic variation between lines with contrasting N dependent grain number response and panicle architectures. Furthermore, differential transcript abundances of specific genes proximally linked to these SNPs in same lines is indicative of their N dependence in a genotype specific manner. Conclusion The study demonstrates the value/ potential of N responsiveness as a selection trait and identifies key genetic components underlying the trait in S. italica. This has major implications for improving crop N sustainability and food security.
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    Exploration of millet models for developing nutrient rich graminaceous crops
    (Elsevier B.V., 2016) Muthamilarasan, Mehanathan; Dhaka, Annvi; Yadav, Rattan; Prasad, Manoj
    Protein-energy malnutrition and micronutrient deficiencies contribute to high mortality among considerable proportion of the current 7.2 billion global populations, especially children. Although poverty and diets poor in nutrition are prime reasons for prevalence of malnutrition, nutritionally dense crops offer an inexpensive and sustainable solution to the problem of malnutrition. Remarkably, millets are nutritionally superior to major non-millet cereals. They especially are rich in dietary fibers, antioxidants, phytochemicals and polyphenols, which contribute broad-spectrum positive impacts to human health. However, millets have received lesser research attention universally, and considering this, the present review was planned to summarize the reports available on nutrition profile of millets and non-millet cereals to provide a comparative insight on importance of millets. It also emphasizes the need for research on deciphering nutritional traits present in millets and to develop strategies for introgressing these traits into other conventional staple crops using germplasm and 'omics' technologies. In some millet species, excellent 'omics' and germplasm panels have started to get available which can act as a starting point for understanding as well as of introgressing healthful traits across millets and non-millet cereals.