Improving Drought-Avoidance Root Traits in Chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) -Current Status of Research at ICRISAT

By P. Gaur, L. Krishnamurthy, J. Kashiwagi. 2008

189 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Abstract Chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.), an important food legume grown in the semi-arid tropical and Mediterranean regions, suffers substantial yield loss due to drought at the end of the growing season (terminal drought), as the crop is largely grown rainfed in post-rainy season on progressively receding soil moisture conditions. Root traits have been identified to postpone dehydration (drought avoidance hereafter) under moisture stress. The root length density (RLD) in the relatively shallow soil layers and the maximum root depth (RDp) were found to positively influence the seed yield under terminal drought environments. Considerable progress has been made to improve the methodology for sampling and analysis of roots. Using a PVC cylinder technique, the mini-core collection (n=211) of chickpea germplasm was evaluated for a number of root traits, including root biomass, RLD and RDp. A few germplasm accessions were identified to have a more prolific root system than the previously identified germplasm line ICC 4958, the best-known source of high root biomass. The germplasm accession ICC 8261 was identified to have the best combination of both RLD and RDp. Molecular markers have been identified for one major quantitative trait locus (QTL) that accounts for about one-third of the variation in root biomass (as measured by total root dry matter) and RDp from study of recombinant inbred lines (RILs) derived from a cross between ICC 4958 and Annigeri. New RIL populations, developed from two other crosses (ICC 8261 × ICC 283 and ICC 4958 × ICC 1882) involving parents having larger variation for root traits than between Annigeri and ICC 4958, are being studied to identify additional QTLs for root traits. Marker-assisted breeding for improvement of root traits in chickpea is expected to promote the development of varieties with greater drought avoidance.

Subfields: Plant Science

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Citations in the corpus

Impact of Genomic Technologies on Chickpea Breeding Strategies (2012, background): “Efforts are being made to develop varieties with a vigorous and deeper root system to improve drought tolerance [28].”
Small temporal differences in water uptake among varieties of pearl millet (Pennisetum glaucum (L.) R. Br.) are critical for grain yield under terminal drought (2013, background): “Differences in root morphology may also be responsible for differences in terminal drought tolerance among different crops (Price and Tomos 1997; Tuberosa et al. 2002; Kashiwagi et al. 2006; Gaur et al. 2008).”
Abiotic stresses, constraints and improvement strategies in chickpea (2014, background): “…ILC3832, FLIP98-141, ILC3182, FLIP98-142C, ILC3101 and ILC588 Escape through earliness Sabaghpour et al. (2006) ICC8261 Avoidance through root traits Gaur et al. (2008) Beja and Kesseb Lower nodule mortality Labidi et al. (2009) ICC4958, ICC8261 Root length density and root dry weight…”
Sources of tolerance to terminal drought in the chickpea (Cicer arietinum L.) minicore germplasm (2010, background): “Although early duration genotypes are considered to be the best adapted to peninsular India (Saxena, 1987; Gaur et al., 2008; Kumar and Abbo, 2001), such as Annigeri, these results showed that slightly later flowering genotypes reached higher yield under stress.”
Modelling possible benefits of root related traits to enhance terminal drought adaptation of chickpea (2012, background): “Therefore, the root QTL identified in chickpea, which is currently used for introgression in popular varieties (Gaur et al., 2008) and considered as a “drought tolerance QTL”, is likely to be more appropriately identified a plant-growth-vigor QTL.”
Impact of High Temperature and Drought Stresses on Chickpea Production (2018, background): “Early varieties such as KAK 2 (kabuli) and JG 11 (desi) have provided stable chickpea productivity in south India [38].”
Breeding Annual Grain Legumes for Sustainable Agriculture: New Methods to Approach Complex Traits and Target New Cultivar Ideotypes (2015, unknown): “Genetic variability for root architecture has been reported in pea (McPhee, 2005; Bourion et al., 2007; Figure 7), lentil (Gahoonia et al., 2005) and chickpea (Gaur et al., 2008).”