Abstract
Metabolomics is an emerging branch of “omics” and it involves identification and quantification of metabolites and chemical footprints of cellular regulatory processes in different biological species. The metabolome is the total metabolite pool in an organism, which can be measured to characterize genetic or environmental variations. Metabolomics plays a significant role in exploring environment–gene interactions, mutant characterization, phenotyping, identification of biomarkers, and drug discovery. Metabolomics is a promising approach to decipher various metabolic networks that are linked with biotic and abiotic stress tolerance in plants. In this context, metabolomics-assisted breeding enables efficient screening for yield and stress tolerance of crops at the metabolic level. Advanced metabolomics analytical tools, like non-destructive nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR), liquid chromatography mass-spectroscopy (LC-MS), gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC-MS), high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), and direct flow injection (DFI) mass spectrometry, have sped up metabolic profiling. Presently, integrating metabolomics with post-genomics tools has enabled efficient dissection of genetic and phenotypic association in crop plants. This review provides insight into the state-of-the-art plant metabolomics tools for crop improvement. Here, we describe the workflow of plant metabolomics research focusing on the elucidation of biotic and abiotic stress tolerance mechanisms in plants. Furthermore, the potential of metabolomics-assisted breeding for crop improvement and its future applications in speed breeding are also discussed. Mention has also been made of possible bottlenecks and future prospects of plant metabolomics.
Highlights
Metabolomics is an emerging branch of “omics” and it involves identification and quantification of metabolites and chemical footprints of cellular regulatory processes in different biological species
It is based on a detailed evaluation of metabolite levels under a specific plant ecology to pinpoint the effects on plant adaptation and any modifications in their genetic architecture
We further focus on the fast-growing era of metabolomics-assisted breeding for crop improvement and the pitfalls in current metabolomics studies are outlined
Summary
Metabolomics is one of the emerging and fascinating approaches of omics tools, which has been extensively applied for crop improvement. Another important application of metabolomics, termed as ecological metabolomics, deals with the analysis of plant biochemical connections across distinct temporal and spatial systems It aims to decipher the possible impact of abiotic/biotic stresses on any vital biochemical process though metabolite identification in response to environmental factors. Primary metabolism results in the production of secondary metabolites, like flavonoids, atropine, carotenoids, and phytic acid These are not essential for plant survival and are produced in response to different stress conditions, such as high temperature, chilling, drought, salinity, and insect/pest attack. The plant metabolome consists of some specialized secondary metabolites, such as phenolics (~10000), alkaloids (~21000), and terpenoids (>25000), that offer tolerance against biotic/abiotic stresses Many of these specialized compounds have been discovered as unique biomarkers that measure plant performance under stress environments and serve as vital components for many crop improvement programs [9]. We further focus on the fast-growing era of metabolomics-assisted breeding for crop improvement and the pitfalls in current metabolomics studies are outlined
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