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Wheat, an important cereal crop globally, faces major challenges due to increasing global population and changing climates. The production and productivity are challenged by several biotic and abiotic stresses. There is also a pressing demand to enhance grain yield and quality/nutrition to ensure global food and nutritional security. To address these multifaceted concerns, researchers have conducted numerous meta-QTL (MQTL) studies in wheat, resulting in the identification of candidate genes that govern these complex quantitative traits. MQTL analysis has successfully unraveled the complex genetic architecture of polygenic quantitative traits in wheat. Candidate genes associated with stress adaptation have been pinpointed for abiotic and biotic traits, facilitating targeted breeding efforts to enhance stress tolerance. Furthermore, high-confidence candidate genes (CGs) and flanking markers to MQTLs will help in marker-assisted breeding programs aimed at enhancing stress tolerance, yield, quality and nutrition. Functional analysis of these CGs can enhance our understanding of intricate trait-related genetics. The discovery of orthologous MQTLs shared between wheat and other crops sheds light on common evolutionary pathways governing these traits. Breeders can leverage the most promising MQTLs and CGs associated with multiple traits to develop superior next-generation wheat cultivars with improved trait performance. This review provides a comprehensive overview of MQTL analysis in wheat, highlighting progress, challenges, validation methods and future opportunities in wheat genetics and breeding, contributing to global food security and sustainable agriculture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Characterization and evaluation of plant genetic resources play an important role for their utilization in the crop improvement programmes. Methods and results: This study involves the agro-morphological and cooking quality besides, molecular characterization of 51 genotypes/advance breeding lines of rice from Kashmir Himalayas. Significant variability was observed for all agro-morphological and cooking quality traits among all the studied genotypes. Cluster analysis using UPGMA method divided the genotypes into two major clusters having 15 and 36 genotypes. Thirty eight genotypes screened using 24 SSR markers detected 48 alleles with 2.0 alleles for each locus with average polymorphism information content (PIC) of 0.37. High polymorphism information content (PIC) values was observed for the primers RM263 (0.67), RM159 (0.59) and RM333 (0.50). Furthermore, out of 38 SSR markers screened on 192 temperate rice germpalsm lines, R4M17 accurately differentiated indica and temperate japonica genotypes amplifying 220 bp and 169 bp, respectively. Accordingly, 15 genotypes were reported as indica and 28 temperate japonica in addition to 149 genotypes as intermediate types. Conclusion: The information on marker-based diversity and performance based on cooking quality and agronomic traits helped to select the most divergent lines for crossing. Also the analysis was useful to classify the temperate germplasm into indica and temperate japonica. The classification could be helpful to devise a strategy for inter-sub species hybridization to breed for improved rice varieties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) is one of the principal cereal crops grown in Western-Himalayas of India. A set of 105 barley genotypes including 38 two-rowed and 67 six-rowed genotypes were phenotyped for 10 important quantitative traits. The analysis of trait data of pre-harvest sprouting tolerance (PHST), growth, yield and yield contributing traits revealed significant variation in the germplasm and led to the identification of promising candidate genotypes for all the traits. In addition, a set of 96 barley genotypes were subjected to molecular characterization using 14 unlinked SSR markers (7 random and 7 genic SSR markers). The analysis of SSR marker data revealed a total of 67 alleles (range 2 to 8) with an average of 4.78 alleles/locus. While analyzing the data separately for random and genic SSR markers, it was observed that genic SSR markers are slightly less diverse (4.71 alleles/locus) than random genomic SSR markers (4.85 alleles/locus). A set of three markers including two random (XBmac156 and XBmag378) and one genic (XGbm1221) SSR marker detecting 7–8 alleles were found most polymorphic/informative markers for the study of allelic diversity in barley. The clustering of 96 genotypes based on genotypic data categorized all the genotypes into three broad clusters, sub- clusters and sub-sub clusters. The genotypes clustered in three sub-clusters did not show any trait-specific relationship with each other. The overall result of genotypic data analysis indicated moderate-level of genetic diversity in the 96 barley genotypes. The diverse and most promising genotypes identified for different traits during the present study could prove useful in future barley breeding programs worldwide. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]