Abstract

Grain legumes, including common-bean, chickpea, pigeonpea, pea, cowpea, lentil and others, form important constituents of global diets, both vegetarian and non-vegetarian. Despite this significant role, global production has increased only marginally in the past 50 years. The slow production growth, along with a rising human population and improved buying capacity has substantially reduced the per capita availability of food legumes. Changes in environmental climate have also had significant impact on production, creating a need to identify stable donors among genetic resources for environmentally robust genes and designing crops resilient to climate change.

Genetic and Genomic Resources of Grain Legume Improvement is the first book to bring together the latest resources in plant genetics and genomics to facilitate the identification of specific germplasm, trait mapping and allele mining to more effectively develop biotic and abiotic-stress-resistant grains. This book will be an invaluable resource for researchers, crop biologists and students working with crop development.

• Explores origin, distribution and diversity of grain legumes
• Presents information on germplasm collection, evaluation and maintenance
• Offers insight into pre-breeding/germplasm enhancement efforts
• Integrates genomic and genetic resources in crop improvement
• Internationally contributed work

"Curators at gene banks and researchers — most in Syria, India, and Nigeria — survey the scientific literature to identify genetic resources available for improving 11 grain legumes, also called field legumes and pulses, for various purposes. The legumes are European common beans, peas, chickpeas (garbanzo beans) faba (fava, broad) beans, cowpeas, lentils, pigionpeas, peanuts, the Asian vigna, grass peas, and horsegram."--Reference & Research Book News, December 2013