Wheat farmers in the UK and India are applying nitrogen fertiliser that largely goes to waste, polluting groundwater and generating greenhouse gases. This UK-India research centre will identify the genes that control how efficiently wheat plants take up and use nitrogen, then give breeders the molecular tools to develop varieties that need less fertiliser. The problem is stark: nitrogen fertiliser is the biggest cost in wheat production, yet much of it is never absorbed by the crop. Excess nitrogen leaches into water supplies and converts to nitrous oxide, a potent greenhouse gas. Current wheat varieties waste a significant fraction of applied nitrogen, and climate uncertainty makes this worse. If the centre succeeds, farmers could maintain yields with substantially less fertiliser. This would cut production costs, reduce water pollution, and lower agriculture’s carbon footprint. The genetic markers and breeding strategies developed here will be shared globally, and because similar nitrogen-use mechanisms exist in other plants, the findings could extend to rice, maize, and other staple crops. The centre will also train early-career scientists and create shared genetic resources that sustain UK-India collaboration long after the grant ends.
View original technical description
Wheat is the most important staple crop grown in the UK, and one of the two major crops grown in India. Nitrogen fertiliser is a key determinant of yield and the major cost of wheat production in both countries and excessive application can result in pollution of groundwater and increased production of greenhouse gases. Breeders and farmers in the UK and India have worked hard to improve the efficiency of use of applied nitrogen, by improving the uptake and utilization efficiency within the crop through genetic improvement, together with the precision of fertilizer application in the field. However, further improvements are required to face the challenges of increasing crop production for an expanding global population with increasing uncertainty of climate. Both yield and quality attributes are dependent upon nitrogen inputs and need to be incorporated into economic and sustainable solutions. We will therefore bring together the major UK and Indian wheat researchers with programmes on wheat improvement to determine the genetic control of nitrogen use efficiency in wheat. These comprise scientists from five Universities and Institutes in the UK and from six in New Delhi, Haryana and the Punjab, which is the major wheat-producing area of India. The studies will focus on comparisons of wheat lines and populations which differ in their nitrogen use efficiency. These lines will be grown in field experiments in both countries and studied in detail using a range of biochemical and molecular genetic approaches. This will lead to the identification of genes and molecular markers that can be exploited by wheat breeders globally, and to new strategies for improving the precision of nitrogen application which will delivered to farmers via well-established mechanisms in both countries. Furthermore, since similar mechanisms are expected to determine nitrogen use efficiency in other plant species the results should be of wider applicability to other crops and countries. In addition to supporting a closely integrated research programme in the UK and India, the Centre will also provide a legacy of shared facilities, technologies, genetic material and datasets that will facilitate longer term bilateral collaborations, and provide training in crop genetics and genomics and exchanges for early career scientists and students in both countries.
Plain English summaries and category classifications on this site are generated by AI and may not perfectly reflect the original research.
Is something wrong? Let us know