Kufri Bhaskar is a heat tolerant table potato variety suitable for early planting in Northern plains and for main season planting in Central plains. It is a cross of Kufri Khyati and Kufri Surya. Its plants are tall and vigorous with tolerance to mite and hopperburn. It produces attractive white-cream, ovoid tubers with shallow eyes and cream flesh, possesses 20% tuber dry matter and very good keeping quality. Kufri Bhaskar was trialed across the major growing regions of India along with popular heat tolerant check varieties Kufri Surya and Kufri Kiran. Kufri Bhaskar has ability to produce up to 11% higher tuber yield than heat tolerant variety Kufri Kiran and 17% over popular variety Kufri Surya across potato growing regions of country.

Salinity stress is a major constraint on potato (Solanum tuberosum L.) production, particularly in salinity-proneregions such as the Indo-Gangetic plains. This study evaluated 58 potato genotypes, including 54 advanced breeding linesand 4 released varieties, under control (ECe < 1 dS/m) and saline (ECe ~ 6.8-7.05 dS/m) environments. Genotypes wereassessed for key agronomic traits, including marketable tuber yield (MTY), non-marketable tuber yield (NMTY), totaltuber yield (TTY), marketable and non-marketable tuber no. and dry matter content (DM%). Salinity stress significantlyreduced MTY and TTY, with yield reductions ranging from 1.86% to 65.74% and an average reduction of 31.70%. Genotypessuch as WS/19-911 (yield reduction – 1.86%), WS/17-321 (2.39%) and WS/18-407 (3.16%) demonstrated superior tolerance,exhibiting minimal yield reductions, while others, including WS/17-717 (65.74%), WS/19-701 (63.64%) and WS/17-813 (60.43%),showed high susceptibility. Among released varieties, Kufri Bahar exhibited the lowest yield reduction (7.32%) in thecurrent investigation. The Stress susceptibility index (SSI) varied across genotypes, with tolerant lines maintaining stableyields under stress. These findings highlight the potential of salinity-tolerant genotypes for breeding programs aimed atimproving potato productivity in saline environments. This research underscores the importance of selecting genotypesthat combine high marketable yields with resilience to salinity stress for sustainable cultivation.

Indian potato production potential (54 million tonnes) strengthens the cause of export of this crop from the country. Government of India has identified districts of Agra and Farrukhabad in Uttar Pradesh, and Sabarkantha and Banaskantha in Gujarat for potato export promotion in the Agri- export policy-2018. However, issues like suitable varieties, sustainable production and protection technologies, and efficient marketing channel are challenges for acceleration of potato export in a significant way. One of the critical gaps, suitable export potential varieties was taken up in current study. Eight potato varieties were evaluated in replicated field trials at farmer’s fields in district Agra and Gandhinagar. Based upon yield performance and feedback from exporters, potato varieties Kufri (K) Frysona (35.3), K Ganga (31.8), K Chipsona-3 (28.2), K Sangam (28.0) and K Bahar (24.0) have better export-grade (>55mm) tuber production potential (tha-1) in western Uttar Pradesh. Variety K Chipsona-3 (30.7), K Sangam (29.6), K Ganga (27.2) and K Frysona (24.9) are exhibiting prospects of export from Gujarat. Newly released specialty potato cv. K Neelkanth has also attracted the attention of exporters. Suitable potato varieties acceptable for importing destinations and Good Agricultural Practices (GAP) developed by ICAR- CPRI holds a better future for Indian potato export.

Kufri (K) Daksh is a main season, medium maturing, high yielding, water-use-efficient table potato variety that can be grown in regions with limited water availability. It is a clonal selection from the cross between CP1748, having high water use efficiency and LT-1 tolerating high temperature stress. Its plants are tall and vigorous with field resistance to late blight. Its tubers are white-cream (light yellow), ovoid with shallow to medium eyes and cream flesh with good keeping quality. It is fertilizer responsive and can yield 30-35 t/ha under low water (≤ 20%) availability in middle Gangetic plains. K Daksh has better trade-off for high CO2 gain and low water loss through optimization in plant canopy leaf area and plant height components. K Daksh can be an excellent choice to tolerate high temperature and water stress regimes in changing climatic scenarios.

The potato originated in southern Peru and north-western Bolivia (South America). However, native accessions have also been cultivated in India for many years. Late blight, caused by the fungus Phytophthora infestans, is the most devastating potato disease, while potato cyst nematode (Globodera spp.) (PCN) is another economically significant quarantine-requiring pest in India. In this study, we have generated a new Indian native collection of 94 potato accessions collected from different parts India. These accessions were screened against late blight and potato cyst nematode resistance by using gene-based molecular markers and phenotypic screening methods. Marker assisted selection using R1 gene-specific marker CosA210 revealed a late blight resistance gene in 11 accessions. PCN resistance bands were found in 3 accessions with marker TG689141, 5 accessions with marker 57R452, and 1 accession having Gro1-4-1602 marker for G. rostochiensis (Ro1,4), while 64 accessions amplified marker HC276 indicating G. pallida (Pa2,3) resistance gene (GpaVvrn QTL). On the other hand, phenotypic screening against late blight resistance under natural epiphytic conditions (hot-spot) revealed three accessions with high resistance, while others were resistant (1 accession), moderately resistant (5 accessions), susceptible (29 accessions), and highly susceptible (56 accessions). For G. rostochiensis (golden cyst nematode) and G. pallida (white cyst nematode) resistance, accessions were grouped into highly resistant (3, 3), resistant (0, 2), moderately resistant (6, 29), susceptible (32, 30), and highly susceptible (53, 30), respectively, for the two PCN species. Collectively, we identified promising accessions with high resistance to late blight (JG-1, Kanpuria Safed, and Rangpuria), and also highly resistant to both Globodera species (Garlentic, Jeevan Jyoti, and JG-1). Our findings suggested that these accessions would be useful for late blight and PCN resistance breeding, as well as future molecular studies in potatoes.

Main conclusionAbiotic stresses adversely affect the productivity and production of vegetable crops. The increasing number of crop genomes that have been sequenced or re-sequenced provides a set of computationally anticipated abiotic stress-related responsive genes on which further research may be focused. Knowledge of omics approaches and other advanced molecular tools have all been employed to understand the complex biology of these abiotic stresses.A vegetable can be defined as any component of a plant that is eaten for food. These plant parts may be celery stems, spinach leaves, radish roots, potato tubers, garlic bulbs, immature cauliflower flowers, cucumber fruits, and pea seeds. Abiotic stresses, such as deficient or excessive water, high temperature, cold, salinity, oxidative, heavy metals, and osmotic stress, are responsible for the adverse activity in plants and, ultimately major concern for decreasing yield in many vegetable crops. At the morphological level, altered leaf, shoot and root growth, altered life cycle duration and fewer or smaller organs can be observed. Likewise different physiological and biochemical/molecular processes are also affected in response to these abiotic stresses. In order to adapt and survive in a variety of stressful situations, plants have evolved physiological, biochemical, and molecular response mechanisms. A comprehensive understanding of the vegetable's response to different abiotic stresses and the identification of tolerant genotypes are essential to strengthening each vegetable's breeding program. The advances in genomics and next-generation sequencing have enabled the sequencing of many plant genomes over the last twenty years. A combination of modern genomics (MAS, GWAS, genomic selection, transgenic breeding, and gene editing), transcriptomics, and proteomics along with next-generation sequencing provides an array of new powerful approaches to the study of vegetable crops. This review examines the overall impact of major abiotic stresses on vegetables, adaptive mechanisms and functional genomic, transcriptomic, and proteomic processes used by researchers to minimize these challenges. The current status of genomics technologies for developing adaptable vegetable cultivars that will perform better in future climates is also examined.

Potato is the third most important crop. Its production and quality is greatly affected by various biotic stresses. In this study, 216 Solanum tuberosum subsp. tuberosum accessions were screened for late blight, viruses (PVY and PVX) and potato cyst nematodes (PCNs) resistance using robust molecular markers. Solitary or combined late blight resistant genes ( R1 , Rpi-abpt , R3a , R3b ) presence was observed in 51 accessions. For PVY resistance, markers STM0003, RYSC3, and YES3-3 A were found in 38, 3, and 1 accession, respectively, and PVX resistance gene markers 1Rx1 and 106Rx2 were found in 19 and 10 accessions, respectively. The STM0003 marker was present in 38 accessions, of which 12 were resistant to PVY and 10 were susceptible. The genotype data on six markers for both the species of PCN showed 45 resistant accessions. A combined analysis of all markers for late blight identified six accessions with all the three resistance genes. Similarly, four accessions, i.e., CP 4226, CP 2049, CP 3696, and CP 3651 had both Rx1 and Rx2 genes for PVX resistance, while only one accession, viz., CP 2049 showed the presence of both H1 and HC genes along with the Gpa2 marker for PCN resistance. There were also seven resistance genes found in CP 2049 for late blight (2), PCN (4), and PVX (2), but none of the accession had genes for all four traits. The results revealed that developing potato varieties with combined resistance to late blight, viruses, and PCN requires concerted hybridization between different parental lines.

Biological control of mosquito is an eco-friendly approach for the control of some vector borne diseases. Numerous tools have been developed and applied to scale down the mosquito population, but the ultimate goal of these different strategies is only to mitigate the menace of mosquito and effectively prevent malaria like diseases. Unfortunately, most of these vectors control measurement the time limited prevention of diseases. For example, they were used as an insecticide, but insecticide resistant mosquito vectors are developed in course of time. Major efforts may be focused on generating eco-friendly alternatives. In current scenario there are many potential alternatives for eradicating and controlling the mosquito vectors biologically. Effective use of aquatic insect predators, larvivorous fishes, symbiotic bacteria, microbial agent and entopathogenic fungi for this purpose are still rather unexplored calling for further research. Biological control of mosquito vectors has been validated for several advantages over insecticides. To resolve the problem of current dependence on insecticidal-based mosquito elimination the option of biological control of this vector is ecofriendly and sustainable. The current knowledge of bio-controlling agents highlighting its significance in the field of public health with respective have been reviewed in this article along with the prospective challenges and opportunities.

The present study explicitly evaluated the genetic structure of Aedes aegypti Linn, the vector of dengue, chikungunya, and Zika viruses, across different geo-climatic zones of India and also elucidated the impact of ecological and topographic factors. After data quality checks and removal of samples with excess null alleles, the final analysis was performed on 589 individual samples using 10 microsatellite markers. Overall findings of this study suggested that, Ae. aegypti populations are highly diverse with moderate genetic differentiation between them. Around half of the populations (13 out of 22) formed two genetic clusters roughly associated with geographical regions. The remaining nine populations shared genetic ancestries with either one or both of the clusters. A significant relationship between genetic and geographic distance was observed, indicating isolation by distance. However, spatial autocorrelation analysis predicted the signs of long-distance admixture. Post-hoc environmental association analysis showed that 52.7% of genetic variations were explained by a combination of climatic and topographic factors, with latitude and temperature being the best predictors. This study indicated that though overall genetic differentiation among Ae. aegypti populations across India is moderate (Fst = 0.099), the differences between the populations are developing due to the factors associated with geographic locations. This study improves the understanding of the Ae. aegypti population structure in India that may assist in predicting mosquito movements across the geo-climatic zones, enabling effective control strategies and assessing the risk of disease transmission.

A field experiment was carried out in a subtropical region of India. The main purpose of this experiment was to grow different wheat genotypes under different nutrient doses and find out which genotype performed better in terms of yields and other attributes under nutrient constraints. Nine varieties of wheat (T. aestivum and T. durum L.) were selected and grown as test crops in the current investigation, adopting a split plot design that was replicated three times, with nutrient dose as the main plot and varieties as sub treatments. In the treatmentT1 = control, T2 = 100% (N+P+K), T3 = 50% N+100% (P+K), and T4 = 50% P+100% N+K, there are 36 plots in a block (9 varieties x 4 fertilizer N and P treatments). Of the nine varieties grown under normal N and P conditions, varieties NARMADA 14 and GW 366 had the highest P content in grain and straw. GW366 (10.93 kg/ha) had the highest average total P uptake, followed by NARMADA14 (10.90 kg/ha). Under normal doses of N and P, the variety HI 1531 (15.25%) had the highest apparent recovery of P, followed by NARMADA14 (15.15percent).Across all fertilizer N and P dosages, the highest average agronomic efficiency for P was found in GW366 (40.09%), followed by LOK1 (37.93%). NARMADA 14 and GW366 have the highest P content in grain and straw of the nine varieties grown under normal nitrogen conditions. Agronomic use efficiency and physiological use efficiency were generally substantially higher when computed on a P basis than they were when calculated on an N basis. P fraction concentrations in black soil varied, but they responded similarly to crop species and N sources. The N supply had an impact on the amounts of P taken from the soil. In P-deficient soils, the use of an appropriate N source and the selection of the right crop species may boost crop yield and plant P uptake.

The allelic variations in a diversity panel of 353 potato accessions, including 256 accessions belonging to Solanum tuberosum sub spp. tuberosum, 49 accessions belonging to Solanum tuberosum sub spp. andigena, and 48 Indian potato varieties were analysed using 25 simple sequence repeat (SSR) markers. The SSR allelic profiles revealed high levels of polymorphism and distinctness among the accessions studied. A total of 343 alleles of 25 SSR markers were observed in the diversity panel of 353 highly diverse tetraploid potato accessions. The number of alleles produced per SSR varied from 8 for the marker STM1053 to 25 for the marker STIKA. The polymorphic information content (PIC) ranged from 0.66 (STG0010) to 0.93 (STM1106) with an average of 0.82. The cluster analysis using the SSR allelic profiles of 353 accessions divided the population into five major groups. The association mapping for late blight resistance identified six markers with the general linear model (GLM), and out of these six markers significance of three markers was reconfirmed with the mixed linear model (MLM). The findings of this study suggest that SSRs are the appropriate markers for evaluating genetic diversity and population structure within different potato germplasm collections. A significant diversity across the tetraploid potato accessions was observed. Moreover, the markers identified in this study could be useful in marker-assisted selection (MAS) breeding in potato for late blight resistance (LBR).

Some characteristics of nitrogen metabolism were observed in the flag leaf on the main branch of wheat (Triticum aestivum L. and Triticum durum L.) In the current study, nine varieties were chosen and planted as test crop using split plot design and replicate at three times, with nutrient dose as the main plot and varieties as the sub plot treatment cultivated at three different soil nitrogen and phosphorus levels (0, 60, and 120 kg/hac) and (0, 30, and 60 kg/hac). These nitrogen and phosphorus levels were handled using four different treatments, where T1 served as the control, T2 as the nitrogen and phosphorus dose at its optimal level, and T3 as the half-nitrogen and full-phosphate fertilizer doses. Fertilizer dosages of T4 that were half nitrogen and half phosphorus were studied. Flag leaf blades were seen to be engaged in NO-3 assimilation. The flag leaf blade had the highest nitrate reductase activity, free amino acid content, and soluble protein content among all the leaf blades. The activity of nitrate reductase was markedly increased by the addition of nitrogen to the soil. The presence of substrate-dependent enzyme activity was demonstrated inflag leaf tissue. A coincidental association between enzyme activity and the buildup of reduced nitrogen in the plant shown the rise in nitrate reductase activity in response to more nitrogen and the increase vegetative reduced nitrogen. A substantial positive connection was discovered between nitrate reductase activity (expressed as molesN/hac.each season) and grain nitrogen (kg N/hac) at maturity because the transfer of vegetative nitrogen to the grain was homogeneous across treatments. Additionally, there was a strong and positive correlation between seasonal nitrate reductase and grain yields (kg/hac.). In cultivars resistant to lodging, maintaining nitrate reductase activity during the reproductive period might boost grain protein production and avoid the decrease of grain protein percentage that is usually seen when grain yields are high.

Background: In this study, the impact of integrated nutrient management practice in cereal based cropping sequence has been examined. A detail study about the impact of INM in the above cropping system for last 8 years has been carried out. Method: On-station research experiments were conducted at Karjat centre of district Raigad of Maharashtra, under the ICAR-Indian Institute of Farming Systems Research, Modipuram, Meerut of ICAR-All India Co-ordinated Research Project during the years 2010-11 to 2017-18 on integrated nutrient supply (INM) system in rice – rice (Oryza sativa L.) cropping system at Karjat. Result: 100% recommended NPK dose through fertilizers was identified as the best INM practice at Karjat during kharif season. A detail study about the impact of INM in the above cropping system for last 8 years has been carried out and presented in tabular as well as graphical view both.

The root is an important plant organ, which uptakes nutrients and water from the soil, and provides anchorage for the plant. Abiotic stresses like heat, drought, nutrients, salinity, and cold are the major problems of potato cultivation. Substantial research advances have been achieved in cereals and model plants on root system architecture (RSA), and so root ideotype (e.g., maize) have been developed for efficient nutrient capture to enhance nutrient use efficiency along with genes regulating root architecture in plants. However, limited work is available on potatoes, with a few illustrations on root morphology in drought and nitrogen stress. The role of root architecture in potatoes has been investigated to some extent under heat, drought, and nitrogen stresses. Hence, this mini-review aims to update knowledge and prospects of strengthening RSA research by applying multi-disciplinary physiological, biochemical, and molecular approaches to abiotic stress tolerance to potatoes with lessons learned from model plants, cereals, and other plants.

Water deficit in soil during formative growth stage adversely hinders the crop productivity. Plant develop a key chain of mechanisms to cope these strains. Characterization of genotypes under water deficit will provide the basis for breeding new germplasm for efficient utilization of water and nutrients and adaptation to water stress. To achieve this, two tolerant (Co 98014 and Co 0118) and two sensitive (CoJ 85 and Co 89003) sugarcane genotypes were assessed for antioxidant response followed by differential expression of three aquaporin genes (ShPIP2-1, ShPIP-5 and ShPIP2-6) under two water deficit conditions. The MDA and H2O2 contents were significantly higher (p < 0.05) in sensitive genotypes as compared to tolerant ones, whereas SOD activity was higher (p < 0.05) in tolerant than sensitive genotypes. The transcript analysis of AQPs reveals upregulation of ShPIP2;5, whereas down-regulation of ShPIP2;1 and ShPIP2;6 when plants were imposed to water deficit conditions. The findings under study suggested the role of PIP2 AQPs in regulation of plant water status under water deficit conditions.

Nitrogen (N) is an important nutrient for plant growth. However, its excess application leads to environmental damage. Hence, improving nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) of plant is one of the plausible options to solve the problems. Aim of this study was to identify candidate genes involved in enhancing NUE in potato cv. Kufri Gaurav (N efficient). Plants were grown in aeroponic with two contrasting N regimes (low N: 0.75 mM, and high N: 7.5 mM). Higher NUE in Kufri Gaurav was observed in low N based on the parameters like NUE, NUpE (N uptake efficiency), NUtE (N utilization efficiency) and AgNUE (agronomic NUE). Further, global gene expression profiles in root, leaf and stolon tissues were analyzed by RNA-sequencing using Ion Proton (TM) System. Quality data (>= Q20) of 2.04-2.73 Gb per sample were mapped with the potato genome. Statistically significant (P <= 0.05) differentially expressed genes (DEGs) were identified such as 176 (up-regulated) and 30 (down-regulated) in leaves, 39 (up-regulated) and 105 (down-regulated) in roots, and 81 (up-regulated) and 694 (down-regulated) in stolons. The gene ontology (GO) terms like metabolic process, cellular process and catalytic activity were predominant. Our RT-qPCR analysis confirmed the gene expression profiles of RNA-seq. Overall, we identified candidate genes associated with improving NUE such as superoxide dismutase, GDSL esterase lipase, probable phosphatase 2C, high affinity nitrate transporters, sugar transporter, proline rich proteins, transcription factors (VQ motif, SPX domain, bHLH) etc. Our findings suggest that these candidate genes probably play crucial roles in enhancing NUE in potato.

The CLC de novo assembler is a support system for large data sets and integrated scaffolding for joining contigs based on paired reads information. It is designed to accept a combination of data from Illumina, 454, SOLiD, Ion Torrent and Sanger sequencing as a mix of paired and unpaired reads which allows the quality analysis of SRA data from different sequencing technologies, to be exploited. In the present study, transcriptome data of three different physiological stages of potato tubers i.e. Dormant tuber (DT), Dormancy release tuber (DRT) and Sprouting tuber (ST) were studied for computational quality analysis. A total no. of 38,714,870 paired sequences of DT (ID: SRR1039535), 38,669,102 paired sequences of DRT (ID: SRR1103933) and 38,753,150 paired sequences of ST (ID: SRR1103934) were downloaded from SRA database in FastQ format. The De novo assembly resulted with 50849 (DT), 44550 (DRT) and 46254 (ST) contigs. The values for N50 and average contig length recorded 1,016(DT), 1,118 (DRT), 1,015 (ST) and 680(DT), 725(DRT), 685(ST) respectively They have been analysed for quality check with the Per-sequence analysis, Per-base and Over-representation analysis using CLC workbench which includes different categories resulting in good quality of data.

STATUS OF GROUNDWATER AND CROPPING PATTERN IN DIFFERENT DISTRICTS OF CHHATTISGARH PLAIN ZONE