Speed Breeding: Rapid Method for Generation Advancement and Development of Crop Varieties

Rapid growing of population demands the production of crop with higher yields in less time. Speed Breeding (SB) techniques significantly accelerates breeding cycles and helps in development of improved cultivars in shorter period. It has been used in genetic mapping, genome editingGenome editing, and marker assisted selectionMarker assisted selection (MAS) etc. to speed up the process of development of new cultivars. But faces challenges related to infrastructure, genotypic variations, and potential stress responses. Single plant selection, high density planting and single seed descent methods are the important components of speed breedingSpeed breeding and a powerful approach to address global food demand. In this more number of breeding cycles per year. Besides all, speed breeding significantly saves the resources as advancing of segregating generation is cheaper when compared to field experiments. Speed breedingSpeed breeding integrated with genomic tools like gene editing, genomic selectionGenomic selection (GS), high-throughput phenotyping, rapid population development, etc. would boost the genetic understanding and enhances the genetic gain. The initial high costs may pose a hindrance but cheaper alternatives can be explored.