Author: Sweta Mishra, Shailesh Kumar and A K Singh
Crop varieties are the fundamental input in agriculture. Maintenance of varietal purity is a significant component of crop improvement. High demand for some of the crop varieties often gives rise to certain level of adulteration in the seed supply chain that lead to the sale of spurious seed. This ultimately leads to yield loss and compensatory issues on legal grounds. The issues of compensation have become a problem with the release of many similar-looking varieties that are genetically very close, and hence, are difficult to differentiate.
The purity of crop varieties needs to be safeguarded without any ambiguity in the context of seed marketing. It is difficult to differentiate seeds of various crop varieties accurately based on visual observations alone. The morphological descriptors that are used for varietal identification are influenced by environment. The morphological observations need to be recorded throughout the crop growth season. Recent scenario of development of a number of morphologically and genetically more identical varieties has made the task of identifying a variety unambiguously more complicated. These environmental limitations demand supplemental support of a new technique which shall be environmentally independent, quick and reliable.
DNA barcoding uses specific regions of DNA in order to identify species. Initiatives are taking place around the world to generate DNA barcodes for all groups of living organisms and to make these data publically available in order to help understand, conserve, and utilize the world’s biodiversity. It can be used to identify and discriminate at any developmental stage from which DNA can be extracted. DNA barcode helps in the identification of varieties and germplasm characterization with high precision, which is stable, unaltered by the influence of environment, epistatic interactions and pleiotropic effects.
India is one of the major producer and consumer of many horticultural, medicinal, vegetable, cereal, pulse and oilseed crops which are being cultivated in different agro-climatic zones. Some of these crops hold enormous potential to be utilized as value added products, thereby providing higher economic return to small and marginal farmers. Characterization of the varieties and the landraces of these crops is a prerequisite for understanding the extent of diversity, identification of valuable traits required for their improvement and defining the conservation needs leading to cataloguing of these crop varieties.
The establishment of genome and transcriptome sequencing projects for many crops has led to generation of a huge wealth of sequence information that could find much use in identification of crop species and their varieties. Prompt and accurate varietal identification has become universal necessity due too rapid globalization of trade, escalating influence of climate change and urgent need for biodiversity conservation. DNA barcoding of crop varieties will provide ready access to information on their biology, ecology, and socio-economic significance.
DNA barcoding is both an important research and science education tool. It is a powerful tool to empower, engage, and educate students in the scientific method while conducting productive and creative research. In this time of major biodiversity loss, there is a necessity to identify and catalogue crop varieties to establish the baseline biodiversity in agriculture, counteract the disappearance of cultivars, discover marketplace replacements and enhance crop productivity. Genetic marketplace monitoring can become a promising tool for detecting fraudulent. It will lead to technological revolution in agriculture sector in India.
DNA barcoding will not just foster vibrant, innovative and impact driven research, and will also lead to academic excellence. The DNA barcode library can be used by all the existing National bureaus to tag, catalogue and conserve all the existing germplasm. DNA barcoding will revolutionize man’s relationship with crop diversity.
Authors:
Dr. Sweta Mishra (Associate Professor, COB, SVPUA&T, Meeurt-250110)
Dr. Shailesh Kumar (Assistant Professor, CBS&H, RPCAU, Pusa, Bihar-848125, India
Dr. A K Singh (Professor, CBS&H, RPCAU, Pusa)
Agricultural Science Articles 