Kailash Chandra

By Subhash Chand, Kailash Chandra, Indu and Champa Lal Khatik

Agriculture is the backbone of India and improved agricultural practices principally depend on the use of newly evolved improved variety. In the Indian scenario, a statutory varietal release system is working where notification and denotification process are playing a crucial role in quality regulation of seed. Crop research institutes of ICAR (Indian Council of Agricultural Research), SAUs (State Agricultural Universities) and private seed companies are the main pillars to develop improved varieties in India. The thumb rule is, the improved variety must have a higher yield compared to the existing one (national and state check varieties) and this is ensured via several multilocational evaluations at a different level. This article covers the Indian regulatory system of variety release, evaluation process at a different level, and the importance of notification and denotification. This information will help the scientific community in regards to suggesting improved variety for general cultivation by farmers.

Part of the book: Plant Breeding

By Gayatri Kumawat, Chander Kanta Kumawat, Kailash Chandra, Saurabh Pandey, Subhash Chand, Udit Nandan Mishra, Devidutta Lenka and Rohit Sharma

Burgeoning the human population with its required food demand created a burden on ever-decreasing cultivated land and our food production systems. This situation prompted plant scientists to breed crops in a short duration with specific traits. Marker-assisted selection (MAS) has emerged as a potential tool to achieve desirable results in plants with the help of molecular markers and improves the traits of interest in a short duration. The MAS has comprehensively been used in plant breeding to characterize germplasm, diversity analysis, trait stacking, gene pyramiding, multi-trait introgression, and genetic purity of different cereals, pulses, oilseeds, and fiber crops, etc. Mapping studies pointed out several marker-trait associations from different crop species, which specifies the potential application of MAS in accelerating crop improvement. This chapter presents an overview of molecular markers, their genesis, and potential use in plant breeding.

Part of the book: Plant Breeding

By Rekha Sodani, Udit Nandan Mishra, Subhash Chand, Indu, Hirdayesh Anuragi, Kailash Chandra, Jyoti Chauhan, Bandana Bose, Vivek Kumar, Gopal Shankar Singh, Devidutta Lenka and Rajesh Kumar Singhal

Light is crucial environmental factor for primary resource and signalling in plants and provide optimum fitness under fluctuating environments from millions of year. However, due to urbanization, and human development activities lot of excess light generated in environment during night time and responsible for anthropogenic generated pollution (ALAN; artificial night light pollution). This pollution has cause for serious problem in plants as it affects their processes and functions which are under the control of light or diurnal cycle. Plant biorhythms mostly diurnal rhythms such as stomatal movements, photosynthetic activity, and many more metabolic processes are under the control of period of light and dark, which are crucially affected by artificial light at night. Similarly, the crucial plant processes such as pollination, flowering, and yield determining processes are controlled by the diurnal cycle and ALAN affects these processes and ultimately hampers the plant fitness and development. To keep in mind the effect of artificial light at night on plant biorhythm and eco-physiological processes, this chapter will focus on the status of global artificial night light pollution and the responsible factors. Further, we will explore the details mechanisms of plant biorhythm and eco-physiological processes under artificial light at night and how this mechanism can be a global threat. Then at the end we will focus on the ANLP reducing strategies such as new light policy, advanced lightening technology such as remote sensing and lightening utilisation optimisation.

Part of the book: Light Pollution, Urbanization and Ecology

By Subhash Chand, Om Prakash Patidar, Rajat Chaudhary, Ranjit Saroj, Kailash Chandra, Vijay Kamal Meena, Omkar M. Limbalkar, Manoj Kumar Patel, Priya P. Pardeshi and Prashant Vasisth

Brassica spp., commonly known as rapeseed-mustard, plays a significant role in the Indian economy by providing edible oils, vegetables, condiments and animal feed. Globally, India holds second and third position in rapeseed-mustard area under cultivation and production, respectively. However, anthropogenically accelerated climate change thwarts yield potential of rapeseed-mustard by employing abiotic (drought, flood, temperature variation and salinity) and biotic (disease and insects) stresses. Various approaches such as molecular breeding, pre-breeding, −omics and biotechnological interventions have been used to develop varieties for improved yield and oil quality, climate resilient and resistance or tolerance to abiotic and biotic stresses. In this context, this chapter highlighted the different cytoplasmic male sterility (CMS) sources and their potential use for hybrid development. At the end, this chapter also enlisted salient achievement by the government and non-government institutes and briefly described the future perspective for improvement of rapeseed-mustard in India.

Part of the book: Brassica Breeding and Biotechnology