Instant Insights

This book features five peer-reviewed reviews on improving nitrogen-use efficiency (NUE).

The first chapter provides an overview of the recent advances in optimising NUE in crop production, focussing on broadacre cereals and oilseeds. The chapter also addresses the impact of underfertilisation and overfertilisation on crop yield, grain quality and profit.

The second chapter outlines recent advances in understanding nitrogen (N) cycling in soil, as well as the main issues researchers and farmers are presented with when attempting to optimise productivity while minimising environmental impacts.

The third chapter considers the ways in which molecular interventions can be used to optimise crop NUE in rice and how these interventions can contribute towards producing rice genotypes with high yields at low N-inputs.

The fourth chapter reviews the principal mechanisms of N-uptake and efficient capture by crop root systems. The chapter also details the impact of abiotic stress factors on N-uptake and proliferation, such as soil structure and overall health.

The final chapter reviews the role of traits related to N-uptake, N-assimilation and N-remobilisation in breeding more efficient varieties of wheat. The chapter also discusses future major research trends, such as high-throughput phenotyping.

John Angus graduated B. Agr. Sc. and PhD from the University of Melbourne. He worked as a Research Scientist at CSIRO Canberra from 1973 until 2010, with visiting scientist positions at the International Rice Research Institute and the Swedish University of Agricultural Science along the way. After retirement he remains an honorary fellow at CSIRO and is also an adjunct professor at Charles Sturt University in Wagga Wagga. He is a fellow of the Australian and American Societies of Agronomy and has served as President of the Agronomy Australia. He was the 2006 recipient of the Australian Medal of Agricultural Science and the 2019 recipient of the Colin Donald medal of Agronomy Australia.

Dr N. Raghuram is a Professor and Founder-Head of the Centre for Sustainable Nitrogen and Nutrient management, School of Biotechnology, Guru Gobind Singh University, New Delhi. He was formerly the Dean of Biotechnology and Chair of the International Nitrogen Initiative (INI). He edited several special issues of international journals on NUE and sustainable N management, and currently is the Editor in Chief of Physiology and Molecular Biology of Plants. He is a steering committee member of the UNEP Global partnership on Nutrient Management (GPNM).

Professor Malcolm Hawkesford is head of the Plant Sciences Department at Rothamsted Research and leads the Institutes contribution to the UK Designing Future Wheat strategic research programme. He is a Honorary Professor in Plant Sciences in the School of Biosciences, University of Nottingham. He is an investigator on multiple international programmes with Brazil and India, is a lead investigator in the Defra-funded Wheat Genetic Improvement Network, participates in multiple BBSRC-funded projects aimed at optimizing resource use in wheat and is the lead scientist for major wheat GMO field experiments at Rothamsted. He is chair of the Nutrient Use Efficiency Expert Working Group of the International Wheat Initiative.