International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), Km. 45, Carretera Mexico, El Batan, Texcoco, Mexico.
Research Council Centre of Excellence in Plant Energy Biology, Research School of Biology, The Australian National University Canberra, Acton, ACT 2601, Australia.
Trends Plant Sci. 2021 Jun;26(6):607-630. doi: 10.1016/j.tplants.2021.03.011. Epub 2021 Apr 20.
Asymmetry of investment in crop research leads to knowledge gaps and lost opportunities to accelerate genetic gain through identifying new sources and combinations of traits and alleles. On the basis of consultation with scientists from most major seed companies, we identified several research areas with three common features: (i) relatively underrepresented in the literature; (ii) high probability of boosting productivity in a wide range of crops and environments; and (iii) could be researched in 'precompetitive' space, leveraging previous knowledge, and thereby improving models that guide crop breeding and management decisions. Areas identified included research into hormones, recombination, respiration, roots, and source-sink, which, along with new opportunities in phenomics, genomics, and bioinformatics, make it more feasible to explore crop genetic resources and improve breeding strategies.
作物研究投资的不平衡导致了知识的缺失，也错失了通过发现新的性状和等位基因来源和组合来加速遗传增益的机会。根据与大多数主要种子公司的科学家的磋商，我们确定了几个具有三个共同特征的研究领域：（i）在文献中相对代表性不足；（ii）在广泛的作物和环境中提高生产力的可能性高；（iii）可以在“竞争前”空间进行研究，利用以前的知识，从而改进指导作物育种和管理决策的模型。确定的领域包括对激素、重组、呼吸、根和源库的研究，以及表型组学、基因组学和生物信息学的新机会，这使得探索作物遗传资源和改进育种策略变得更加可行。
