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ARS Home » Pacific West Area » Logan, Utah » Forage and Range Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #370863
Research Project: Improved Plant Genetic Resources and Methodologies for Rangelands, Pastures, and Turf Landscapes in the Semiarid Western U.S.

Location: Forage and Range Research

Title: Roadmap for accelerated domestication of a future perennial grain crop

Author
item DEHAAN, LEE - The Land Institute
item Larson, Steven
item LOPEZ-MARQUES, ROSA - University Of Copenhagen
item WENKEL, STEPAN - University Of Copenhagen
item GAO, CAIXIA - Chinese Academy Of Sciences
item PALMGREN, MICHAEL - University Of Copenhagen

Submitted to: Trends in Plant Science
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 2/14/2020
Publication Date: 6/1/2020
Citation: Dehaan, L., Larson, S.R., Lopez-Marques, R., Wenkel, S., Gao, C., Palmgren, M. 2020. Roadmap for accelerated domestication of a future perennial grain crop. Trends in Plant Science. 25(6):525-537. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tplants.2020.02.004.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tplants.2020.02.004

Interpretive Summary: Shifting our grain crop life cycle from annual to perennial would result in a new form of agriculture that is more environmentally friendly and resilient to climate change, but this has proven to be a challenging goal. On the one hand, efforts to breed perenniality into an annual grain crop such as wheat have so far not been fully successful. On the other hand, efforts to rapidly domesticate perennial grasses such as Thinopyrum intermedium have encountered significant hurdles even though it is closely related to wheat. The recent release of the genome sequence of T. intermedium reveals that many wheat domestication genes are highly conserved in T. intermedium. This suggests a road map for directed accelerated domestication of this plant by the help of molecular tools.

Technical Abstract: Shifting our grain crop life cycle from annual to perennial would result in a new form of agriculture that is more environmentally friendly and resilient to climate change, but this has proven to be a challenging goal. On the one hand, efforts to breed perenniality into an annual grain crop such as wheat have so far not been fully successful. On the other hand, efforts to rapidly domesticate perennial grasses such as Thinopyrum intermedium have encountered significant hurdles even though it is closely related to wheat. The recent release of the genome sequence of T. intermedium reveals that many wheat domestication genes are highly conserved in T. intermedium. This sugests a roadmap for directed accelerated domestication of this plant by the help of molecular tools.