Abstract
Breeding for improved nutritional quality in major staples has been emerged as one of the sustainable solutions to alleviate micronutrient malnutrition problems in the developing countries. Wheat provides one-fifth of global dietary energy and protein demand worldwide. Additionally, wheat products, such as chapatti (flat bread), made of whole grain wheat flour are major sources of micronutrients like Zinc (Zn), Iron (Fe) and Manganese (Mn), Vitamin B and E. An estimated two billion people suffer from Zn and Fe deficiency mainly in South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa. Therefore, genetic enhancement of grain Zn and Fe in an improved wheat genetic background offers cost-effective sustainable solution to the problem. Breeding for nutritional quality in wheat through enhanced concentrations of micronutrients, initiated under the HarvestPlus program by crossing high Zn and Fe sources, identified among synthetic wheats, T. spelta, and landraces from Mexico and Iran. These crosses have resulted in wheat lines with competitive yields and enhanced grain Zn in South Asia. QTL mapping and gene discovery research have identified 5–6 important QTL regions for grain Zn. The high Zn and Fe inheritance are under quantitative genetic control; further progress is possible through pyramiding large effect QTL regions in high-yielding wheats. High-throughput, non-destructive phenotyping for grain Zn and Fe using the X-ray fluorescence (XRF) analysis has facilitated the selection dramatically. Accelerated gene discovery and mapping studies, and genomic selection schemes expected to improve the breeding efficiency.
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Acknowledgments
The authors acknowledge the financial support from the HarvestPlus challenge program and CGIAR research program on Agriculture for Nutrition and Health. Special thanks to Susanne Dreisigacker, CIMMYT Wheat Genomics Laboratory, Mexico.
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Velu, G., Singh, R.P. (2019). Genomic Approaches for Biofortification of Grain Zinc and Iron in Wheat. In: Qureshi, A., Dar, Z., Wani, S. (eds) Quality Breeding in Field Crops. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-04609-5_9
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-04609-5_9
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