Phytohormones in Abiotic Stress

Plants are continuously exposed to different environmental stresses that negatively impact their physiology and morphology, resulting in production reduction. As a result of constant pressure, plants evolve different mechanisms for sustenance and survival. Hormones play a major role in defences against the stresses and stimulate regulatory mechanisms. One of the ways through which they mitigate stress is via the production of hormones like auxins, ethylene, jasmonic acid, etc. The phytohormones help in signaling and enhance the chances of their survival. Plant hormones play many vital roles from integrating developmental events, physiological and biochemical processes to mediating both abiotic and biotic stresses. This book aims to highlight these issues and provide scope for the development of tolerance in crops against abiotic stresses to maximize yield for the growing population. There is an urgent need for the development of strategies, methods and tools for the broad-spectrum tolerance in plants supporting sustainable crop production under hostile environmental conditions.

The salient features are as follows:

• It includes both traditional and non-traditional phytohormones and focuses on the latest progress emphasizing the roles of different hormones under abiotic stresses.
• It provides a scope of the best plausible and suitable options for overcoming these stresses and puts forward the methods for crop improvement.
• It is an amalgamation of the biosynthesis of phytohormones and also provides molecular intricacies and signalling mechanisms in different abiotic stresses.
• This book serves as a reference book for scientific investigators from recent graduates, academicians and researchers working on phytohormones and abiotic stresses.

Dr Dhandapani Raju is a Senior Scientist of Plant Physiology in the Division of Physiology, Indian Agricultural Research Institute (ICAR-IARI), Delhi, India. He completed his under graduation in Agriculture from Tamil Nadu Agricultural University (TNAU), Tamil Nadu, India. He pursued his post-graduation in agriculture with a specialization in plant physiology from C. S. Azad University of Agriculture and Technology, Uttar Pradesh, India. He completed his doctoral degree in plant physiology from the Indian Agricultural Research Institute. He has been awarded “young scientist” by the Indian Society of Plant Physiology, New Delhi, India for his outstanding work on phenotyping banana fruits and identifying vitamin A enrichment gene (phytoene synthase gene) first time in bananas. His academic achievements are evident from possessing various awards, scholarships and merit medals (book prizes, ICAR-JRF, IARI-SRF & ICAR-ARS) at the national level during post-graduation education. He is the recipient of several best poster and oral presentation awards at the national level. Through agricultural research and development, he has invented five technologies, registered three international patents and published more than 15 peer-reviewed articles in both international and national journals of repute. He has currently working on high throughput phenotyping of rice plants for drought tolerance for the last four years. He has hands-on experience in the phenotyping of whole-plant transpiration and developed the software for automatic and near real-time estimation of WUE in rice. He has hands-on experience in both structural and functional genomics techniques for nucleic acid isolation, quality testing and gene expression analysis. He is also involved in teaching and guiding students at the post-graduation level. He has guided 09 MSc students to date. He has conducted three national-level trainings for professionals at state and central levels. Currently, he is working on a national-level multi-institutional project on plant phenomics to develop rice and wheat varieties with improved water use efficiency and nitrogen use efficiency.

Dr R Ambika Rajendran is a Senior Scientist of Plant Breeding in the Division of Genetics, Indian Agricultural Research Institute (ICAR-IARI), Delhi, India. She earned her Bachelors from Tamil Nadu Agricultural University (TNAU), Tamil Nadu, India in 2003, her Masters from Kerala Agricultural University (KAU), Kerala, India in 2005 and obtained her doctorate in 2010 from Tamil Nadu Agricultural University (TNAU). She joined the Directorate of Maize Research (DMR), New Delhi (currently referred to as Indian Institute of Maize Research IIMR, Punjab, India) in 2009 till 2016 later she joined the Division of Genetics, IARI as a scientist in a senior scale in 2016. She has over fifteen years of research experience. She currently works in abiotic stress tolerance and doubled haploidy in soybeans. She worked in maize breeding for high oil along with baby corn. Her significant research includes heterotic grouping and patterning of quality protein maize using molecular markers, in vitro mutagenesis in rice and identification of sources of high oil post-Fusarium stalk rot resistance genetic stocks in maize and identification of tolerant sources for pre-germination anaerobic stress tolerance in soybean. She has edited two books namely “Genetics and Breeding in Pulses” and “Handbook of Cereals” and also served as an editor for a book on “Soybean”. She has many peer-reviewed research articles published in journals of international and national repute and book chapters to her credit. She is also serving as a reviewer in various national and international journals.

Mr Ayyagari Ramlal is a doctoral scholar at the School of Biological Science, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Malaysia. He completed his Bachelor’s and Master’s in Botany from the University of Delhi, Delhi, India in 2017 and 2020, respectively. He has worked as a Junior Research Fellow at the Division of Genetics, Indian Agricultural Research Institute (ICAR-IARI), Delhi, India and Banaras Hindu University (BHU), Uttar Pradesh, India. He also worked on an innovation research project initiated by the University of Delhi. He has received the Young and Best Author awards from different societies/organizations in India. He has published more than 15 peer-reviewed research and review articles in international journals of repute and many book chapters. He served as an editor for a book on “Soybean” and also serving as a reviewer for many international and national journals.

Dr Virendra Pal Singh completed his PhD in Plant Physiology and has over 35 years of research and 27 years of teaching experience. His areas of specialization include post-harvest and seed physiology, abiotic stress and climate change. He is a fellow at the Indian Society for Plant Physiology and served as the editor of the Indian Journal of Plant Physiology for nine years and national consulting editor for the Advances in Plant Physiology series (10 volumes). He is a gold medallist in MSc in Botany with a specialisation in plant physiology. He was awarded a Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) fellowship for PhD and Post-Doctoral. He was awarded the Emeritus Professorship by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICARI), Delhi, India. He worked on an Indo-US project on tropical climate. He has supervised 9 PhD and 3 MSc students and trained many agricultural research service (ARS) scientists. He served as an advisor in various committees of Agricultural Universities and Institutes and Staff Selection Commission, India. He has more than a hundred publications to his credit.