Gulzar S. Sanghera

Engineering cold stress tolerance in crop plants.

Plants respond with changes in their pattern of gene expression and protein products when exposed to low temperatures. Thus ability to adapt has an impact on the distribution and survival of the plant, and on crop yields. Many species of tropical or subtropical origin are injured or killed by non-freezing low temperatures, and exhibit various symptoms of chilling injury such as chlorosis, necrosis, or growth retardation. In contrast, chilling tolerant species are able to grow at such cold temperatures. Conventional breeding methods have met with limited success in improving the cold tolerance of important crop plants involving inter-specific or inter-generic hybridization. Recent studies involving full genome profiling/ sequencing, mutational and transgenic plant analyses, have provided a deep insight of the complex transcriptional mechanism that operates under cold stress. The alterations in expression of genes in response to cold temperatures are followed by increases in the levels of hundreds of metabolites, some of which are known to have protective effects against the damaging effects of cold stress. Various low temperature inducible genes have been isolated from plants. Most appear to be involved in tolerance to cold stress and the expression of some of them is regulated by C-repeat binding factor/ dehydration-responsive element binding (CBF/DREB1) transcription factors. Numerous physiological and molecular changes occur during cold acclimation which reveals that the cold resistance is more complex than perceived and involves more than one pathway. The findings summarized in this review have shown potential practical applications for breeding cold tolerance in crop and horticultural plants suitable to temperate geographical locations.

Phytoremediation: Curing soil problems with crops

Among the different contaminants in the environment, heavy metals (HMs) are unique due to the fact that they cannot be broken down to non-toxic forms. According to the reports published worldwide, these metals are released into the environment by both natural and anthropogenic sources, especially, mining and industrial activities, and automobile exhausts (for lead). They leach into underground waters, moving along water pathways and eventually depositing in the aquifer, or are washed away by run-off into surface waters thereby, resulting in water and subsequently soil pollution. The HM contamination is increasing day by day because of increase in population, industrialization and urbanization. Therefore, posing a serious threat to health and environment. Researchers worldwide have used different methods for removing these hazardous elements. Although, these methods for cleaning up of contaminated environment including soil and water are usually expensive and do not give optimum results. Currently, phytoremediation is an effective and affordable technology used to remove inactive metals and metal pollutants from contaminated soil and water. It includes phytoextraction, rhizofiltration, phytostabilization, phytovolatization, and phytodegradation/ phytotransformation. This technology is ecofriendly and exploits the ability of plants to remediate pollutants from contaminated sites. More than 400 plant species have been identified to have potential for soil and water remediation. Among them, Thlaspi, Brassica, Sedum alfredii H., and Arabidopsis species have been mostly studied. Our paper aims to cover the causes of HM pollution and phytoremediation technology, including HM uptake mechanism and several reports describing its application at field level.

GENETIC DIVERGENCE AMONG ELITE SUGARCANE CLONES (Saccharum officinarum L.) BASED ON CANE YIELD AND QUALITY TRAITS FROM NORTHERN INDIA

Genetic divergence among the twenty four sugarcane genotypes collected from various sugarcane research institutions of northern India were tested in a randomized complete block design with three replicates during the cropping seasons 2013 - 14. The assessment of the genetic diversity was based on the eighteen cane yield and quality characters. The results of the study indicated that, the genotypes were grouped into five clusters based on the genetic distance using Mahalanobiss statistics. Higher inter-cluster distance was recorded between cluster II and V (89.668) indicating high genetic diversity among these two clusters. Thus, exploitation of genotypes within these two clusters as parents for crossing could produce good sugarcane segregants. The lowest intra cluster distance was reported in the cluster III (14.897) revealed that clones are identical and can not to be used as parents in crossing that results hybrid not desirable for the characters studied. A critical analysis of cluster means for different traits indicated that cluster I was desirable for cane yield, CCS (t/ha), single cane weight, stalk diameter, germination (%), cluster II was better for juice extraction percentage, cluster III for better juice purity percent, brix (%), sucrose (%) and CCS (%) for 12 months and cluster V was the best source for NMC (000/ha), stalk length with other good cane and sugar yield traits. The average D

Access and Benefit Sharing on the Use of Indigenous Traditional Knowledge

Knowledge, innovations and practices that are generated in a unique, tradition-based context from indigenous peoples is termed as traditional knowledge that forms an integral part of indigenous peoples’ social, cultural and spiritual values. Access to various biological resources, fair and equitable sharing of benefits from the use of these resources and TK has become an important agenda after the CBD came into force. The debates are still going on the requirement for institutional mechanisms to regulate the access and benefit-sharing agreements, defining ownership of biological resources and their associated TK. With the advent in recent technologies, TK associated with natural biological resources and their economic and scientific importance has attracted a wide range of private sector stakeholders for their utilization. In the past, TK has often been accessed without the consent of the owners of TK and without sharing the benefits arising out of its utilization. Various measures for the protection of TK, through either adapted intellectual property rights or sui generis systems, are in vain as long as the holders of TK and the specific context in which TK has been generated, transmitted and preserved do not enjoy appropriate protection through the recognition of indigenous peoples’ rights. Indigenous rights can gain strength from progress made and legal standards set in international level elaborating measures for the protection of TK and vice versa. This chapter explores and reports the various negotiations on an international regime on access and benefit sharing in the framework of the Convention on Biological Diversity that provides a forum to push indigenous peoples’ right to their TK.