Lathyrus Breeding

Abstract

Grass pea (Lathyrus sativus L.) is a climate-resilient nutrient-dense crop that offers food and nutritional security to many low-income communities of different underdeveloped regions of the world including South Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa and Mediterranean region. It is recognized to have a good source of protein, healthy fatty acids, vitamins and micronutrients, notwithstanding, the stigma of neurotoxin (ODAP) associated with grass pea that cause irremediable neurological disorder in humans and animals. Interestingly, it is the only known dietary source of l-homoarginine a non-proteinogenic amino acid which has admirable medicinal properties. It has better tolerance to different biotic and abiotic stresses as compared to other pulse crops. Over the years, sincere efforts are made towards the genetic improvement of grass pea to subsidize ODAP content and elevate production potential. In this book chapter, the economic importance of the crop, its origin, domestication, evolution, botanical description and floral biology have been illustrated. The accomplishment made in grass pea improvement through conventional and non-conventional breeding approaches, that is selection, hybridization, pre-breeding and distant hybridization along with application of mutation breeding have been reviewed. The current status of genomics resources and marker-assisted breeding has also been deliberated. Moreover, the breeding objectives, major constraints and future thrust areas toward exploring cutting-edge tools and technique for enriching grass pea genomic resources have been outlined. Furthermore, the existing coordinated testing system for new entries and quality seed production has also been reviewed in brief. Overall, to accelerate genetic gain in grass pea along with low ODAP embracement, urgent need is being felt to explore recent advanced tools and techniques such as transcriptomics, proteomics, metabolomics, small RNAomics, epigenomics, interactomics, bioinformatics and genome editing to strengthen the grass pea breeding programme towards its transformation from orphan to main stream crop.KeywordsBreeding objectivesGenetic resourcesGrass peaPre-breedingTrait genetics