Salinity tolerance in Crop plants

What is it about?

Plants employ various mechanisms to cope with salinity stress and activate an array of stress-responsive genes to counteract the salinity-induced osmotic and ionic stresses. Despite a major progress in defining the underlying mechanisms of salinity tolerance, there are still major challenges to be overcome in translating and integrating the resultant information at the molecular level into plant-breeding practices. Various approaches have been suggested to improve the efficiency of plant breeding for increasing plant productivity under saline environments. In this context, breeding for salinity tolerance in crops largely depends upon the availability of genetic resources of tolerance, reliable screening techniques, identification of genetic components of tolerance, and successful genetic manipulation of desired genetic backgrounds.

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Why is it important?

Some of the challenges and opportunities have also been addressed in the present review with a particular emphasis on molecular breeding approaches to be employed in combination with other crop improvement strategies to develop salinity-tolerant cultivars.

Perspectives