Changes in Nitrogen Use Traits Associated with Genetic Improvement for Grain Yield of Maize Hybrids Released in Different Decades

By J. Haegele, K. Cook, D. Nichols, F. Below. 2013

158 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Further enhancement of maize ( Zea mays L.) N-use efficiency (NUE) will benefit from a thorough understanding of how genetic improvement has shaped N use parameters. Since selection for grain yield has occurred at high N fertilizer rates, our hypothesis was that modern hybrids would have a greater response to supplemental N than hybrids from earlier eras. In 2009 and 2010, 21 single-cross maize hybrids released between 1967 and 2006 were characterized for grain yield and N use traits. While the ability to acquire mineralized soil N did not change over era, the utilization increased with decade of introduction (0.24 kg kg –1 of plant N [kg plantN –1 ] yr –1 ; R 2 = 0.37). Increases of grain yield at high N (86 kg ha –1 yr –1 ; R 2 = 0.68) over era were accompanied by increases at low N of 56 kg ha –1 yr –1 (R 2 = 0.69). Grain yield improvements at all levels of N were associated with decreased barrenness and increased kernel number expressed on a per-plant and per-area basis. Fertilizer N response, NUE, increased at a rate of 0.16 kg kg –1 of fertilizer N (kg N –1 ) yr –1 (R 2 = 0.40). Increased NUE was positively correlated with improved N-uptake efficiency ( 0.76, P ≤ 0.001), due to the greater postflowering N uptake of more recent hybrids. The response of grain yield to fertilizer N in current hybrids is more dependent on uptake of fertilizer N than the efficiency of fertilizer N utilization, and approximately two-thirds of genetic gain for grain yield at high N can be explained by improvements in grain yield at low N.

Subfields: Agronomy and Crop Science, Plant Science

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/71a6f32b06f285c12c097fd725194f6f325f515e

How researchers see this paper

The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.

In Agronomy and Crop Science

1. Daniel Rodríguez
2. V. Sadras
3. M. Unkovich
4. Enli Wang
5. B. Mudge
6. M. Bielich
7. P. Hayman
8. Marta Monjardino

In Plant Science

1. V. Sadras
2. Daniel Rodríguez
3. Enli Wang
4. M. Unkovich
5. B. Mudge
6. M. Bielich
7. P. Hayman
8. Marta Monjardino

Citations in the corpus

• Interactions between water and nitrogen in Australian cropping systems: physiological, agronomic, economic, breeding and modelling perspectives (2016, background): “…in nitrogen uptake matched the relative increase in yield at the low fertiliser rate but not at the higher rate, and this was reflected in a reduction in protein content with year of release (Haegele et al. 2013), in a process similar to that described above for wheat in Europe and Argentina.”
• Quantifying crop nitrogen status for comparisons of agronomic practices and genotypes (2014, background): “Indeed, selective pressure for yield and agronomic adaptation has dramatically improved the nitrogen economy of cereals in cropping systems with high (Foulkes et al., 1998; Haegele et al., 2013) and low nitrogen inputs (Sadras and Lawson, 2013).”