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‘Omics’ approaches in developing combined drought and heat tolerance in food crops

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Abstract

Global climate change will significantly increase the intensity and frequency of hot, dry days. The simultaneous occurrence of drought and heat stress is also likely to increase, influencing various agronomic characteristics, such as biomass and other growth traits, phenology, and yield-contributing traits, of various crops. At the same time, vital physiological traits will be seriously disrupted, including leaf water content, canopy temperature depression, membrane stability, photosynthesis, and related attributes such as chlorophyll content, stomatal conductance, and chlorophyll fluorescence. Several metabolic processes contributing to general growth and development will be restricted, along with the production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) that negatively affect cellular homeostasis. Plants have adaptive defense strategies, such as ROS-scavenging mechanisms, osmolyte production, secondary metabolite modulation, and different phytohormones, which can help distinguish tolerant crop genotypes. Understanding plant responses to combined drought/heat stress at various organizational levels is vital for developing stress-resilient crops. Elucidating the genomic, proteomic, and metabolic responses of various crops, particularly tolerant genotypes, to identify tolerance mechanisms will markedly enhance the continuing efforts to introduce combined drought/heat stress tolerance. Besides agronomic management, genetic engineering and molecular breeding approaches have great potential in this direction.

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Acknowledgements

AB, PD, AR, and SC thank CSIR for providing fellowships to conduct the research work. HN is thankful to DST, UGC, DBT, UWA (Australia), ICARDA (Morocco), IIPR (Kanpur), PAU (Ludhiana), and World Vegetable Center for supporting the research work. Contribution number 21-341-J from Kansas Agricultural Experiment Station.

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HN and UJ conceived the idea; UJ, AB, PD, AR, and SC compiled the information. The other authors equally participated in editing and shaping the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Harsh Nayyar.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Communicated by Manzer H. Siddiqui.

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Bhardwaj, A., Devi, P., Chaudhary, S. et al. ‘Omics’ approaches in developing combined drought and heat tolerance in food crops. Plant Cell Rep 41, 699–739 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00299-021-02742-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00299-021-02742-0

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