Abstract
Improving crop performance under water-limiting conditions is essential for achieving environmentally sustainable food production. This requires significant progress in both the identification and characterization of key genetic and physiological processes involved in water uptake and loss. Plants regulate water uptake and loss through both developmental and environmental responses. These responses include: root morphology and architecture, cuticle development, stomatal development, and guard cell movements in response to the environment. Genes controlling root traits and stomatal development and guard cell movements strongly impact water use efficiency (WUE), and represent the best targets for molecular breeding programs. This article provides an overview of the complex networks of genes involved in water uptake and loss. These traits represent novel opportunities and strategies for genetic improvement of WUE and drought tolerance in crops.
Highlights
With a global excess of 663 million people worldwide lacking access to safe water, new sustainable water resource management strategies are necessary [1]
Water-use efficiency (WUE) is broadly defined as the ratio of water used by the plant for metabolism to the water lost through transpiration [6]
We have focused on water uptake efficiency and genes that have been found to be involved in WUE and drought tolerance (Table 1)
Summary
With a global excess of 663 million people worldwide lacking access to safe water, new sustainable water resource management strategies are necessary [1]. Are expected for other important crops such as soybean or rice These models and forecasts highlight the need to develop new varieties with increased drought tolerance and WUE combined with other high-yield traits [17]. WUE represents a performance parameter that can reduce competition for fresh water, increase productivity and survival during periods of drought stress, and contribute to sustainability. This parameter is a complex composite governed by many genes and environmental responses. For WUE improvement, interesting candidates are to be found among stomata sensitivity and the ABA signaling pathway Manipulation of these key processes are promising approaches to obtain drought tolerance and encouraging results have already been achieved in crops such as tomato or sunflower [27]. We have focused on water uptake efficiency and genes that have been found to be involved in WUE and drought tolerance (Table 1)
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