Management and breeding strategies for the improvement of grain and oil quality

AGUIRREZÁBAL, L.A.N.; MARTRE, P.; PEREYRA IRUJO, G.A.; IZQUIERDO, N.G.; ALLARD, V.

Crop Physiology - Applications for Genetic Improvement and Agronomy

Elsevier - Academic Press

Año: 2009; p. 389 - 423

The quality of a harvested organ can most simply be defined as its suitability to the intended market or processing and product manufacture. The term quality may therefore encompass many criteria, as the compositional (chemical) and textural (biomechanical) requirements may vary from one product to another. In this chapter, quality is restricted to the biochemical composition of grains and the focus is on sunflower as an oilseed model and bread wheat as a cereal model. Comparisons with other species are included to emphasise similarities and differences with these model crops. The chapter comprises three main parts. First, we briefly review the effects of environmental, genetic and GE factors on grain oil and protein concentration and composition. Second, we outline process-based crop models accounting for grain yield in both species, and for concentration and composition of oil (sunflower) and protein (wheat). Third, we use a combination of modelling and experiments to analyse the relationships between quality traits and yield, and management and breeding strategies for the improvement of grain quality.