The Application of Biotechnology in Rice (Oryzae sativa) Quality Improvement

Abstract

Cereals are one of the important foods and rice is important cereal grain and one of the most consumed staple foods around the world next to wheat. From the importance this crop provides nutritional, food security, economic and cultural importance is the major ones in the world. Rice is an autogamous plant propagating through seeds produced by self-pollination and also propagated by asexual propagation especially to generate transgenic crops by using tissue /cell culture techniques. Rice is a diverse crop that grows in different ecosystems. The Green Revolution saved millions of people with additional food but could not prevent hunger and poverty because of certain limitations and inadequate management available to take full advantage of the Green Revolution. Current gene revolution should provide wide scope for the application of biotechnology across ecosystems and crop barriers. Biotech rice has been developed using tissue culture, genetic engineering and molecular marker to address concerns that focus on the profitability of rice farming such as pest and disease resistance, abiotic stress tolerance and value-adding rice through nutritional improvement. In addition, basic studies to increase rice yield are underway including the incorporation of genes in the C4 pathway, a more efficient converter of light energy and carbon dioxide into food assimilates. Moreover, basic research on rice production of cloned seed has been started and promising results are being generated. This will considerably reduce the cost of production of hybrid rice, an important breeding strategy in rice production. DOI: 10.7176/ALST/85-02 Publication date: January 31 st 2021