Abstract
Increasing demands for food and resources are challenging existing markets, driving a need to continually investigate and establish crop varieties with improved yields and health benefits. By the later part of the century, current estimates indicate that a >50% increase in the yield of most of the important food crops including wheat, rice and barley will be needed to maintain food supplies and improve nutritional quality to tackle what has become known as ‘hidden hunger’. Improving the nutritional quality of crops has become a target for providing the micronutrients required in remote communities where dietary variation is often limited. A number of methods to achieve this have been investigated over recent years, from improving photosynthesis through genetic engineering, to breeding new higher yielding varieties. Recent research has shown that growing plants under elevated [CO2] can lead to an increase in Vitamin C due to changes in gene expression, demonstrating one potential route for plant biofortification. In this review, we discuss the current research being undertaken to improve photosynthesis and biofortify key crops to secure future food supplies and the potential links between improved photosynthesis and nutritional quality.
Highlights
Over the last 70 years, agricultural yields have risen at a level that meets global demand
With increasing requirements for food and fuel, the need to develop varieties of important crops with greater yields is at the forefront of agriculture
In recent years, using genetic manipulation to increase the rate of photosynthesis as a means of increasing yields has gained traction
Summary
Over the last 70 years, agricultural yields have risen at a level that meets global demand Most of these increases came about from the breeding of higher yielding varieties and advances in agronomic approaches [1], as well as improving yields by exploiting the natural photosynthetic variation in key crops [2,3]; more recently the yields of several important food crops have plateaued. To meet the ever-growing requirements for both food and fuel, it will be necessary to develop new varieties of crops with higher yields [6,7,8,9]. To increase yields whilst protecting the environment, the development of new varieties of key crops is essential This may be achieved through improving photosynthesis through genetic manipulation (Section 2). I will discuss a multi-targeted approach to increasing photosynthetic efficiency and a targeted approach to the generation of multi-vitamin crops and the potential links between boasting photosynthesis and impact on the final vitamin content of modified crops
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