Fundamentals of Field Crop Breeding

This book is an advanced textbook and a reference book for the post-graduate plant-breeding students and the plant breeders. It consolidates fundamental concepts and also the latest advances in plant-breeding practices including development in crop genomics. It contains crop wise explanation on origin, reproduction, genetics of yield contributing traits, biotic and abiotic stresses, nutritional improvement and crop specific plant-breeding procedures and techniques. The chapters are planned to describe crop-focused breeding procedure for the major crop plants as per their economic importance. The recent developments in breeding of field crops have been reported. The recent progress made in mapping traits of economic importance has been critically reviewed for each crop. The progress made in markers assisted selected in few crops has been summarized. This book bridges the knowledge gap and bring to the researchers and students information on modern breeding tools for developing biotic and abiotic stress tolerant, climate resilient and micronutrient rich varieties of field crops. The chapters in book are contributed by experienced Plant Breeders.

Dr. Devendra Kumar Yadava is serving as ADG Seeds, Indian Council of Agricultural Research, New Delhi. Breeder for last 25 years including 19 years at Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), contributed in the development and release of 21 varieties (mustard 18; pulses 3) including early maturing mustard varieties viz. Pusa Mustard 25, 27, 28, 26 and RGN 145 which have provided greater choice to farmers under changing climatic scenario. Bred six low erucic acid varieties viz., Pusa Mustard 21, 22, 24, 29, 30 and 32; and two Canola quality varieties Pusa Double Zero Mustard 31 and 33. Fellow of National Academy of Agricultural Sciences (NAAS) since 2015 and recipient of many awards like Rafi Ahmad Kidwai Award – 2017, ICAR, New Delhi; Dr. B.P. Pal Memorial Award, 2012, IARI, New Delhi; NAAS Recognition Award-2018; Dr. P.R. Kumar Brassica Outstanding Scientist Award 2017, SRMR, Directorate of Rapeseed Mustard Research, Bharatpur. He has guided three M.Sc. and five Ph.D. students as Chairman and presently guiding four Ph.D. students and published 90 research papers in high impact factor journals.
Dr. Harsh Kumar Dikshit is serving as Principal Scientist at ICAR-Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi (India). He is working on genetic improvement of grain legumes through conventional and molecular approaches. He has developed fifteen varieties of different grain legumes (lentil, mungbean and dry beans) for cultivation in India. He is involved in development of leading mungbean varieties IPM 99-125, IPM 02-3, IPM 02-17 and Pusa 1431 and lentil varieties L 4717 and L 4727. His present focus is on basic and applied research on early maturity, biofortification and biotic stresses of lentil and mungbean. He is faculty of Division of Genetics and is involved in teaching of different courses and thesis research guidance to post graduate students. He has done his Masters and PhD in Plant Breeding from G.B.P.U.A. & T. Pantnagar (India). He is Fellow of ISGPB and ISRPD and recipient of several awards including ICAR-Dr. Rajendra Prasad Award-2020
Dr. Gyan Prakash Mishra is currently working as Principal Scientist at ICAR-Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi (India). Before that he has worked at DRDO-Defence Institute of High Altitude Research, Leh (India) as Scientist ‘C’, ICAR-Directorate of Groundnut Research, Junagadh (India) and ICAR-Indian Institute of Vegetable Research, Varanasi (India) as Senior Scientist. His major research interest includes crop improvement through conventional, molecular and transgenics approaches. He has done his master’s and PhD in Genetics from Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi (India) and postdoc from University of California, Riverside and Purdue University, USA as BOYSCAST-Fellow. As a faculty of Division of Genetics, he is involved in teaching of different courses and also guiding the post-graduate students. He is the recipientof various prestigious awards including NAAS Associate-2018, NASI-Membership-2018, IARI-Merit Medal and Best Student Award-2001, ISCA-Pran Vohra Award-2012, DRDO-National Science day Award-2009, and ICAR-Dr. Rajendra Prasad Award-2020.
Dr. Shailesh Tripathi is currently working as Principal Scientist at ICAR-Indian Agricultural Research Institute, New Delhi (India). Prior to joining IARI, he served as Scientist at International Crops Research Institute for the Semi Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), Hyderabad. He obtained his Ph.D. in Plant Breeding and Genetics in 2004 from G. B. Pant University of Agriculture & Technology, Pantnagar. He was involved in transfer of “QTL hotspot” containing quantitative trait loci for several root and drought tolerance traits into popular chickpea varieties of IARI resulting in the release of drought tolerant chickpea varieties. He also developed chickpea suitable for machine harvesting and extra-large seeded kabuli chickpea. He has published over 45 research papers in peer-reviewed journals. He is actively involved in teaching to post-graduate students as faculty of Genetics at IARI.