A comprehensive approach to enhancing sunflower drought tolerance

Agricultural production faces a significant reduction as a result of unpredictable weather events due to global warming. Among the most significant abiotic stresses contributing to crop yield loss are drought, extreme temperatures, and soil salinity. Sunflower, the fourth most important oil crop worldwide, is considered to be moderately drought tolerant. However, recent studies showed that drought can cause up to 51% yield loss. Breeders are thus facing a complicated challenge - breeding for drought resistance which is a quantitative trait causing complex changes on all levels: morphological, physiological, and molecular. Institute of Field and Vegetable Crops is situated in the Pannonia region which is characterized as one of the European regions that will be the most affected by extreme climate changes such as drought. Within our breeding programs and project activities, we are conducting sunflower phenotyping at the germination stage in in vitro conditions and rhizothrons to identify traits that can be exploited in drought-tolerant sunflower breeding. This research is accompanied by an analysis of the expression of genes identified as of potential interest in enhancing drought tolerance. Further studies will include analysis of lncRNAs and small RNAs to obtain a comprehensive knowledge of mechanisms involved in drought tolerance on a molecular level. The final goal is to identify key drought-tolerant genes as well as epigenetic-targeted genes.