Breeding wheat for resistance to major rust diseases stem rust (Puccinia graminis), stripe rust (Puccinia striiformis), and leaf rust (Puccinia triticina) is a pivotal strategy for advancing sustainable agronomic systems, safeguarding yield potential, and reducing dependence on fungicides. This effort employs race-specific resistance genes, including Lr47, Lr52, Yr5, Yr10, Yr36, Sr31, and Sr24, which confer high efficacy against specific pathogen races but are vulnerable to evolving virulent strains. To complement this, durable adult plant resistance (APR) genes such as Lr34, Lr46, and Sr57 provide broad-spectrum and long-lasting defense by modulating systemic resistance pathways. These genes trigger mechanisms like enhanced signaling cascades and antimicrobial compound synthesis. Genetic introgression from wild relatives, such as Triticum turgidum and Aegilops spp., enriches the wheat gene pool with novel resistance alleles. Cutting-edge methodologies, including marker-assisted selection (MAS), genomic selection, and pathogen monitoring, accelerate the incorporation of resistance genes while mitigating risks posed by pathogen adaptation. Through the strategic integration of genetic resistance and molecular precision, this multidimensional approach forms the basis for the creation of durable resistant varieties. These varieties ensure agronomic sustainability and enhance crop defense against biotic stresses, accounting for the complexities of evolving agro-ecological and climatic dynamics.

Plant improvement strategies involve diverse techniques, ranging from traditional to marker-assisted methods, as well as chemical and radiation treatments. However, these methods can introduce imprecise changes in plant DNA. Accelerating plant enhancement is crucial to meet global food demand, but current methods are time-consuming. Scientists are revolutionizing plant breeding by employing various techniques to develop crops with specific attributes, such as increased yield and pest resistance, aligning with environmental and societal needs. While these methods offer substantial advantages, they often face challenges and can be less precise than desired. Innovative methods, such as gene editing using CRISPR, offer enhanced precision. CRISPR technology enables precise modifications to a plant's DNA, allowing for targeted improvements without unintended consequences. While CRISPR shows great potential, ensuring its safe and accurate implementation is a priority. Scientists are exploring diverse methods, both viral and non-viral, to effectively deliver CRISPR components into plant cells, with non-viral approaches gaining traction due to their safety and versatility. Nanoparticles play a pivotal role in these advancements by serving as delivery vehicles for CRISPR tools. These particles safeguard and transport the necessary components to specific locations within plants, bolstering growth, yield, and disease resistance. Despite challenges, the synergy of nanotechnology and CRISPR holds promise for revolutionizing plant improvement while safeguarding the environment. This integrated approach offers the potential to enhance crop growth and quality while upholding ecological balance.

Food security involves not only ensuring access to adequate food, but also ensuring that the food is nutritious and free from contaminants that can harm human health. Aflatoxins, produced by the fungi Aspergillus flavus and A. parasiticus, are one example of a contaminant that can pose a threat to food security. To address this issue, it is important to implement effective management practices throughout the food chain, from the field to the table, to minimize the risk of aflatoxin contamination. Additionally, promoting awareness about the dangers of aflatoxins at the social level and using a combination of genetic and management practices can help provide a stable and sustainable solution to this problem. This article extensively discusses the harmful effects of Aflatoxins (AFs) and outlines strategies for managing contamination before and after harvest, including the potential for breeding crops with higher resistance. The article also examines the relationship between moisture content and AF contamination in peanuts before harvest. It highlights the impact of AFs on the production of meat, milk, and eggs from animals and underscores the need for a comprehensive policy to prevent AF contamination from entering the food chain at every stage. Improved agronomic practices and cattle feeding, as well as public awareness efforts, can help reduce the risk of AFs in the food supply. With a combination of current genetic improvements and effective pre- and post-harvest management practices, it may be possible to mitigate the issue of AF contamination

Yellow (stripe) rust of wheat is responsible for a severe decrease in crop yield worldwide. Deployment of durable disease resistant cultivars is the best strategy being cost effective and safe. A comprehensive study was conducted to identify sources of durable resistance against stripe rust of wheat. Initially, surveillance of the crop was conducted to expose the status of the dilemma. The study discovered that disease is more prevalent in the region existing in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK) and the Northern Region of Punjab. Race identification of the pathogen under glasshouse conditions revealed high diversity and at least eleven races were designated. Prevalence of the race 70E0 was most dominating (39 %). Cultivation of multi-location trap nurseries yielded valuable information demonstrating disease-fighting genes where, at all locations, Yr5, Yr10, Yr15, and YrSp were effective. Seventy-two advanced lines collected from research institutions were screened in a glasshouse to categorize the test material based on their response to disease at the seedling stage. Test material comprising seventy-two advanced lines collected from different research institutions was screened in a glasshouse to categorize the test material on the ground of their response against disease at the seedling stage. Slow and fast rusters were categorized by studying susceptible and moderately susceptible seedlings in the field for two years. Genetic diversity in the host allows changes in the genetic organization to adapt to environmental changes. Coefficient parentage revealed the test material's restricted genetic base. In the pedigree of wheat advanced lines, Pastor, Kauz, Inqilab-91, Sokoll, Ae. Aquarosa (211), WBLL-1, Kukuna, and Millan were 60% out of a total of 72 parents. Findings of the present studies revealed persistent resistant genotypes with a broad genetic background are needed to feed a growing population.

Pulse beetle (Callosbruchuschinesis) causes serious damage to the seed of chickpea, and other pulses during storage.Seed viability and other quality parameters are affected by its infestation.This pest is controlled by phosphine fumigation and synthetic insecticides.Unfortunately, this pest has developed resistance against these pesticides.Moreover, with application of these pesticides, chemical residues may cause severe damage to non-target organisms.Host plant resistance against insect pests is considered best ecological approach to pest management.Keeping this in consideration, the current research activity is planned to screen out available germplasm of chickpea against dhora beetle (Callosobruchuschinisensis).For this purpose, 8 genotypes of chickpea genotypes were taken from Ayub Agricultural Research Institute, Faisalabad. 1 kg of each genotype was taken in plastic jars.There were three replications of each genotype for each insect.Twenty adults of dhora beetle were discharged in each container which were enclosed with muslin cloth with rubber bands.The Jars were placed at room temperature.Data of egg laying were observed after five days of release of insects.Data of emergence F1 adults were observed after 30 days of storage.At this time percent weight loss and Seed viability was also analyzed.The Same data were observed after two-and three-month storage period.The results revealed that all the varieties/lines differed significantly from one another for percent weight loss and viability.On the basis of percent weight loss, the variety Bittal-2016 was found to be the most susceptible.Whereas the variety Niab-CH-2016 was also found to be the least susceptible.The current research found that none of the chickpea cultivars were totally resistant to C.chinensis, however their vulnerability varied significantly.Finally, the acquired data will be statistically examined for the study of variance via statistical software.Means of significant treatments will be examined at = 5% using the HSD-Tuckey test.

Changes in climate scenario affect natural conditions in farming system, hence affect plant pests and diseases development. Universally, adverse effects of climate changes namely failing the ecosystem apparatuses that control the balance of plant pests and diseases, failing the plant resistance and the development of environmental situation supportive plant pests and diseases growth in general. The disposed cultivars and favorable ecological circumstances play part towards rust diseases in epidemic form. In this study meteorological data and disease incidence data were correlated to establish relationship between environmental variables and stripe rust development. Linear correlation was established among minimum and maximum air temperature and development of rust was positive. Impact of relative humidity could not be assessed because variation in range between minimum and maximum mean relative humidity remained non-significant during the period under study. However, data generated seems insufficient to conclude authentic result to determine the role of relative humidity in stripe rust development. Three genotypes having different responses against stripe rust were studied to correlate the response of yellow rust with epidemiological factors (temperature, relative moisture, and precipitation). Impact of meteorological factors indicated that environment significantly affected disease incidence and severity of yellow rust through its impact on development rate of the pathogen. Same cultivars responded differentially under unlike meteorological conditions.

Gladiolus is an important cut flower in the world, and its preference in Pakistan is next to roses. But the main problem that occurs in gladiolus is that it has short vase life. The present experiment was conducted with an objective to investigate the effect of four preservative solutions [distilled water, Sucrose (3%), AgNO3 (250 ppm), AgNO3 (250 ppm) + Sucrose (3%)] and packaging material on postharvest quality of three gladiolus varieties, “Tissue, White Prosperity and Alexandra”. Packaging material consists of control treatment (without packaging), packaging of cut spikes with 100 ppm acetic acid soaked cotton and packaging of polyethylene sheet after sucrose pulsing. The experiment was arranged as two factorial laid out according to completely randomized design (CRD) having three replications. Results showed that preservative solution having combination of AgNO3 (250 ppm) + Sucrose (3%) significantly improves days to open basal floret, floret opening percentage (%), bloom spread (inch), floret length (inch), floret diameter (inch), fresh spike weight (g), dry spike weight (g), fresh weight loss (%) and vase life (days). Moreover, this treatment was also effective in reducing the wilting (%) in all gladiolus varieties. However, for solution uptake (mL/spike) and solution balance (ml/spike), AgNO3 (250 ppm)alone gives the best results. For packaging treatment, the pulsing of a cut spike with 20% sucrose followed by polyethylene sheet wrapping proves to be effective. Among the varieties, Alexandra performed better for all quality parameters in comparison to White Prosperity and Tissue

In olive, micro-propagation is an effective technique for mass multiplication of disease free, true to type plants, but shoot proliferation in mature tissues of olive is a major difficulty encountered during culture establishment. Thus an experiment was designed with an objective to study the effect of different cytokinins (BAP and Zeatin) on shoot proliferation of two olive cultivars (Earlik and BARI Zaitoon-2). In olive Rugini medium, BAP and Zeatin were added alone and in combination at a concentration of 1 mg L-1 and 2 mg L-1. Experiments were arranged according to completely randomized design (CRD) with three replications per treatment. Results showed that both the olive cultivars performed well when BAP + Zeatin were supplemented to the medium at 2+2 mg L-1 concentration. However, the cultivar “BARI Zaitoon-2” had the highest shooting percentage (90.67 %) and number of nodes per shoot (8.33) in treatment containing BAP (2 mg L-1) + Zeatin (2 mg L-1), whereas, “Earlik” at same concentration had more shoot length (9.10 cm) and number of shoots per explant (3.67). Thus, it was concluded that the findings of these results will help in the future for developing shoot proliferation protocols for other olive cultivars. Moreover, these protocols can also be further be used in other woody plants micro propagation

The theoretical and numerical studies have been made to observe the planar and nonplanar geometries for the nonlinear propagation of the dust-electron-acoustic (DEA) in a dusty plasma (containing initially cold and hot Maxwellian electrons, stationary ions, and charge fluctuating stationary dust grains) using reductive perturbation method. It has also been found that the basic features of the DEA waves are significantly modified by the presence of dust charge fluctuation. The numerical solution to the K-dV equation indicates that the parameters those we have considered in our model blatantly influence the propagation speed and the structure of DEA solitary waves. The geometrical effects on the structure of DEA wave are discussed. It is shown that the amplitude and propagation speed in spherical geometry is larger compared with cylindrical and planar geometries for different values of the above-mentioned parameters. The implications of our results would be useful to understand some astrophysical and cosmological scenarios like stellar polytropes, hadronic matter and quark-gluon plasma, protoneutron stars, and dark-matter halos.

Food safety and food security is usually thought of as a concern for human populations and thus would probably be more focused on the field crops. The study was conducted in the Experimental area of the Department of Plant Breeding and Genetics, to analyze the performance of some lines and testers of sunflower for achene yield and its related morphological traits during 2013-2014. Ten Sunflower lines A6.4, C2.22, C3.14, A2.23, A12.1, 36, C2.19, A13.1, 34 and A12.19 were crossed with five male lines C3.1, A7.3, A12.2, C2.27 and A7.25 in line × tester design. The estimates of general combining ability (GCA) effects for lines showed that the lines C3.41 (-23.5), 34 (2.64), A12.1 (36.5), C2.22 (0.73), A2.23 (2.395),C2.19 (2.168),A2.23 (3.42) A2.23 (0.70) and A12.19 (50.43) showed the significant GCA effects for the following characters, respectively leaf area, number of leaves, stem diameter, fresh head diameter, dry head diameter, average yield per plant, hundred achene weight and average yield per plot, respectively. Heterosis studies revealed that the best cross combination C3.14 × A7.25 for plant height, 34 × C3.1 for number of leaves per plant, A13.1 × C3.1 for leaf area, A6.4 × A12.2 for stem diameter of plant, A2.23 × A12.2 for fresh head diameter, A13.1 × C3.1 for dry head diameter, A12.1 × A7.25 the trait of average yield per plant, 36 × C2.27 for hundred achene weight and A12.1 × A7.25 for average yield per plot.

Drought tolerance is a polygenic trait, with a complicated phenotype, often confused by plant phenology. Breeding for water stress is more complex since many types of abiotic stress, such as drought, heat and salt. High yielding wheat genotypes viz., Miraj-06, 9452, 9469, 9272, 9277, CMS-127 and three testers Chakwal-50, Kohistan-97 and Aas-11 were crossed in line × tester mating design. Seed obtained from crosses was evaluated in field conditions for various agronomic traits under drought conditions. Recorded data were subjected to analysis of variance to determine the genetic variability. The data were analyzed statistically and combining ability studies were tested using line × tester analysis to find the relationship between different traits of wheat. High significant differences were observed among the lines and testers for yield related traits under stress conditions. The female line 9452 proved to be best line on the basis of mean performance of traits under water stress. In case of testers, the male parent variety Chakwal-50 retained its performance in maximum number of traits closely followed by Aas-11. The cross combination 9272 × Aas-11 proved best for attaining highest mean for most of traits. In case of GCA effects line 9277 and tester Aas-11 proved best. The cross combinations 9277 × Chakwal50, 9452 × Kohistan-97 exhibited highest SCA effects. The superior genotypes and crosses can be combined to develop new promising and improved varieties under water stress conditions.

A theoretical investigation has been made of electrostatic solitary structures in an electron-positron-ion (e-p-i) plasma, taking nonextensive electrons and nonextensive positrons. By employing the reductive perturbation method, the basic characteristics of ion-acoustic (IA) solitary waves (SWs) in a three-component e-p-i plasma (consisting of negatively charged nonextensive electrons, positively charged nonextensive positrons, and ions) have been addressed. The Korteweg-de Vries (K-dV), modified K-dV (mK-dV), and Gardner equations are derived and their numerical solutions are obtained. It has been shown that the combined effects of electron nonextensivity, positron nonextensivity, and ions significantly modify the behavior of these electrostatic solitary structures that have been found to exist with positive and negative potential in this plasma model. The present analysis may be useful to understand and demonstrate the dynamical properties of IA SWs in different astrophysical and cosmological scenarios (viz. stellar polytropes, hadronic matter and quark-gluon plasma, protoneutron stars, dark-matter halos, etc.).

A rigorous theoretical investigation has been made of obliquely propagating electrostatic solitary structures in a magnetized plasma, taking into account the effect of nonextensive electrons. By employing the reductive perturbation method, the basic characteristics of obliquely propagating ion-acoustic (IA) solitary waves (SWs) in a cold magnetized electron-ion plasma (consisting of inertial ions and noninertial q -distributed electrons) have been addressed. The Korteweg-de Vries equation is derived and its numerical solution is obtained. It has been shown that the effects of electron nonextensivity and external magnetic field significantly modify the natures of the small but finite-amplitude IA SWs. The present analysis may be useful to understand and demonstrate the dynamical properties of IA SWs in different astrophysical and cosmological scenarios (viz. stellar polytropes, hadronic matter, quark-gluon plasma, protoneutron stars, dark-matter halos, etc.).

The basic features of obliquely propagating dust-ion-acoustic (DIA) solitary waves (SWs) in a nonextensive magnetized dusty plasma (containing non-extensive electrons, inertial ions, and negatively charged stationary dust) have been rigorously investigated. The reductive perturbation method has been employed to derive the Korteweg-de Vries equation which admits a solitary wave solution. The combined effects of electron nonextensivity and external magnetic field (obliqueness), which are found to significantly modify the basic features of the small but finite-amplitude DIA SWs, have explicitly been examined. Our present analysis can be utilized and very effective for understanding the localized nonlinear structures-the DIA SWs in different astrophysical and cosmological scenarios (viz. stellar polytropes, quark-gluon plasma, protoneutron stars, etc.).

A theoretical investigation has been made of obliquely propagating dust-acoustic solitary waves in a magnetized three-component dusty plasma, which consists of a negatively charged dust fluid, ions, and nonextensive electrons. The reductive perturbation method has been employed to derive the Korteweg-de Vries equation which admits a solitary wave solution. It has been shown that the combined effects of external magnetic field (obliqueness), ions, and electron nonextensivity change the behavior of these electrostatic solitary structures that have been found to exist with positive and negative potential in this dusty plasma model. The implications of our results in astrophysical and cosmological scenarios like vicinity of the Moon, magnetospheres of Jupiter and Saturn, dark-matter halos, hadronic matter, quark-gluon plasma, protoneutron stars, stellar polytropes etc. have been mentioned.

Estimation of combining ability is an essential process in cereal breeding and dissection of the genetic basis of combining ability would enable wheat breeding.The efficiency of breeding strategies to enhance drought tolerance in wheat could be increased further if some of the complications in gene-to- phenotype (G P) relations related with epistasis, pleiotropy and genotype-by-environment interactions could be captured in realistic G P models and characterized in a quantifiable manner useful for variety. Wheat is a staple food crop in Pakistan. Wheat is a rich and economical source of protein. Prerequisite of food is aggregating day by day with the growing population. Demand of wheat is also increasing with high population. Wheat breeders are trying to get maximum yield with limiting resources. Water limitation is a big problem among the major reasons. It is a great challenge for a plant breeder to face different types of drought. Due to water stress the grains are desiccated and also results in early maturity of the crop. Wheat is grown under a diverse range of areas and environmental conditions. The present review will help the readers to understand breeding of wheat under drought conditions. This review showed that desiccation tolerance index and percent seedling recovery may be useful for seedling parameters. Drought tolerant wheat genotypes give the best production in rainfed areas. It might be concluded that the lines with increased general combining ability effects would give better results for improving grain yield and spike traits.