Abstract
The Cucurbitaceae family provides numerous important crops including watermelons (Citrullus lanatus), melons (Cucumis melo), cucumbers (Cucumis sativus), and pumpkins and squashes (Cucurbita spp.). Centers of domestication in Africa, Asia, and the Americas were followed by distribution throughout the world and the evolution of secondary centers of diversity. Each of these crops is challenged by multiple fungal, oomycete, bacterial, and viral diseases and insects that vector disease and cause feeding damage. Cultivated varieties are constrained by market demands, the necessity for climatic adaptations, domestication bottlenecks, and in most cases, limited capacity for interspecific hybridization, creating narrow genetic bases for crop improvement. This analysis of crop vulnerabilities examines the four major cucurbit crops, their uses, challenges, and genetic resources. ex situ germplasm banks, the primary strategy to preserve genetic diversity, have been extensively utilized by cucurbit breeders, especially for resistances to biotic and abiotic stresses. Recent genomic efforts have documented genetic diversity, population structure, and genetic relationships among accessions within collections. Collection size and accessibility are impacted by historical collections, current ability to collect, and ability to store and maintain collections. The biology of cucurbits, with insect-pollinated, outcrossing plants, and large, spreading vines, pose additional challenges for regeneration and maintenance. Our ability to address ongoing and future cucurbit crop vulnerabilities will require a combination of investment, agricultural, and conservation policies, and technological advances to facilitate collection, preservation, and access to critical Cucurbitaceae diversity.
Highlights
A limited number of plant families supply the majority of crops that form the basis for human diets
Other large collections of C. melo not recorded in the GeneSys database (Table 2), are maintained in Uzbekistan with 1330 accessions, China (CAAS—Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences), and India (ICAR—National Bureau of Plant Genetic Resources (NBPGR), New Delhi URL: nbpgr.ernet.in)), which is notable for its wealth of melon germplasm
These analyses can identify gaps in collections or geographical regions that may be important for further acquisitions or in situ protection. These analyses provide the potential to establish genomically informed core populations or other tailored subsets to facilitate the identification, mapping, and utilization of valuable traits
Summary
A limited number of plant families supply the majority of crops that form the basis for human diets. Nakai), melons (Cucumis melo L.), cucumbers (Cucumis sativus L.), and pumpkins and squashes (Cucurbita spp.) These crops, which are primarily consumed for fruits and seeds, are noted for remarkable diversity in fruit size, shape, and color, providing both culinary and aesthetic value (Figure 1). The importance of ex situ collections for ensuring future food security and responding to increasing environmental challenges is recognized by Global Crop Diversity Trust (https://www.croptrust.org/project/conservation-strategies/) (Accessed 27 May 2021) [28], whose mission is to preserve crop diversity. C. melo includes a remarkably diverse group of herbaceous, annual plants of commercial importance worldwide They are best known for their sweet, dessert fruits, primarily eaten fresh, but bitter or bland fruits are consumed as vegetables, and in some countries (e.g., India and Turkmenistan), the seeds are eaten. In countries where seeds are eaten, they provide high-quality oil and proteinaceous meals and may be found in local markets as a component of “roaster mixes,” along with other cucurbit seeds [30,34]
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