应用生理学方法和分子手段进行玉米抗旱育种

干旱是包括中国在内的世界上大多数玉米生产国家的重要农业灾害之一,解决干旱问题的有效途径包括培育抗旱型和节水型的玉米杂交种.多年来,通过常规手段进行玉米抗旱育种取得了一定进展,但由于多方面原因,其育种效率没有得到进一步提高.而与此同时,对玉米在干旱胁迫下的生理生化途径研究很多,其成果可以为抗旱育种提供理论指导;尤其是近年来应用分子标记技术和基因组学技术对玉米抗旱性进行了深入的遗传剖析,其研究结果也为玉米抗旱分子育种提供了新的手段和思路.同时评述了相关研究领域的进展,并讨论今后的发展趋势。

Integration of Physiological and Molecular Approaches in Maize Breeding for Drought Tolerance

Drought is one of the disastrous limiting factors for maize production in the world including China.The development of maize hybrids with drought tolerance and high water use efficiency is an effective approach to solving the problem.In the past decades,considerable progress has been made in maize breeding for drought toler-ance using conventional methods,but with low breeding efficiency due to various causes.Meanwhile,physiological and biochemical studies on drought tolerance in maize have obtained a large amount of knowledge and information which can guide practical breeding programs.Particularly,in-depth genetic dissection of drought tolerance in maize using molecular markers and genomics approaches has been carried out in the past decade,which generated the knowledge to be used in molecular breeding.The present paper reviews and discusses the advances and the trends in related fields of breeding for drought tolerance in maize.