Institutional Publications

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Genetics and genomics interventions for promoting millets as functional foods
(Bentham Science, 2021) Dhaka, Annvi; Singh, Roshan Kumar; Muthamilarasan, Mehanathan; Prasad, Manoj
Several crops, including millets with immense nutritional and therapeutic values, were once a part of our regular diet. However, due to domestication and selection pressures, many of them have become marginally cultivated crops confined to a particular region, race, or locality. Millets are a perfect example of neglected species that have the potential to address both food and nutritional insecurities prevalent among the ever-growing global population. Starvation and malnutrition contribute to a large number of health-related issues, being the main reason behind the occurrence of most of the severe diseases worldwide. These constraints are repeatedly disturbing both the social and economic health of global society. Naturally, millets are rich in minerals, nutrients, and bioactive compounds, and these crops are less dependent on synthetic fertilizers, systemic irrigation, and pest/weed control. Given this, the review emphasizes the nutritional values, health benefits, processing techniques, and genomic advancements of millets. In addition, it proposes a roadmap for enhancing the utility and commercialization of millets.
Small millets for enduring food security amidst pandemics
(Elsevier B.V., 2021) Muthamilarasan, Mehanathan; Prasad, Manoj
Highlights Over-reliance on a small number of major cereals impacts on the food and nutritional security of the global population, particularly during abnormal situations. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic challenges the lives and livelihood of marginal communities by limiting their access to these crops. Diversification of food crops is necessary to address food and nutritional security, and promoting the cultivation of alternative crops in marginal areas is imperative. Food security is an ongoing problem, and current staple foods are not sufficient to overcome challenges such as the present COVID-19 pandemic. We propose here that small millets have the potential to become new staple crops, especially in hunger hotspots. Currently, the absence of intensification of millet farming, lack of deployment of genetic tools for trait improvement, and the need for optimization of storage and supply chains limit crop production. We highlight a roadmap to strengthen small millet cultivation, such as identifying varieties suitable for particular environments and targeting trait improvement using genetic and genomic approaches. These approaches will help to combat hunger and malnutrition and also economically benefit the farmers and stakeholders involved in small millet cultivation amidst the ongoing pandemic.
Millets for next generation climate-smart agriculture
(Frontiers Media S.A., 2017) Bandyopadhyay, Tirthankar; Muthamilarasan, Mehanathan; Prasad, Manoj
Panicoids (subfamily: panicoideae) are a group of C4 grasses, which include agronomically important crops such as sorghum and maize, bioenergy feedstocks including sugarcane and miscanthus, nutri-cereals such as millets, and biofuel crops including switchgrass, napier grass and guinea grass. Among these, millets are known for their climate-resilient features including adaptation to a wide range of ecological conditions, less irrigational requirements, better growth and productivity in low nutrient input conditions, less reliance on synthetic fertilizers, and minimum vulnerability to environmental stresses (Kole et al., 2015). Also, millets are nutritionally superior to other major cereals as they are rich in dietary fibers, resistant starches, vitamins, essential amino acids, storage proteins and other bioactive compounds (Amadou et al., 2013). These attributes have made millets a crop of choice for cultivation in arid and semi-arid regions of the world; however, the less attempt has been made to study the climate-resilient features of millets compared to other major cereals. Among millets, foxtail millet (Setaria italica) and its wild progenitor, green foxtail (S. viridis) are extensively studied since they are considered as models for studying the traits related to C4 photosynthesis, stress biology, and bioenergy characteristics (Muthamilarasan and Prasad, 2015). The availability of genome sequence information of these two species (Bennetzen et al., 2012; Zhang et al., 2012) has unlocked the wealth of information pertaining to stress tolerance and biofuel characteristics. It has also expedited the development of large-scale genomic resources for crop improvement. On the other hand, studies on other millets are still in their infancy. The challenge to feed the ever-growing population with a healthy balanced diet and the threats faced by agricultural crops due to changing climate highlight the immediate requirement to exploit the beneficial attributes of millets. This could be utilized for the improvement of millets per se as well as other related grass species. The extensive gene-level synteny shared between the grass genomes would facilitate the transfer and introgression of useful genes, alleles and quantitative trait loci (QTL) of agronomic importance identified in millets to other major cereals. In the above context, this article advocates for initiating extensive research on millets to dissect their agronomic, nutritional as well as stress tolerance traits and develop strategies to transfer the useful traits to cultivated major cereals such as rice, wheat, maize, and sorghum.

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