This Book Is The Compilation Of The World Literature On Diseases Of Pigeonpea, An Important Pulse Crop Of The Indian Subcontinent, Africa, Australia And South America.

Food legumes are important constituents of the human diet and animal feed where they are crucial to a balanced diet, supplying high quality proteins. These crops also play an important role in low-input agricultural production systems by fixing atmospheric nitrogen. Despite systematic and continuous breeding efforts through conventional methods, substantial genetic gains have not been achieved. With the rise in demand for food legumes/pulses and increased market value of these crops, research has focused on increasing production and improving the quality of pulses for both edible and industrial purposes. "Biology and Breeding of Food Legumes" covers the history, origin and evolution, botany, breeding objectives and procedures, nutritional improvement, industrial uses and post-harvest technology and also recent developments made through biotechnological intervention.

While a good grasp of the many separate aspects of agriculture is important, it is equally essential for all those involved in agriculture to understand the functioning of the farming system as a whole and how it can be best managed. It is necessary to re-assess and understand rain-fed farming systems around the world and to find ways to improve the selection, design and operation of such systems for long term productivity, profitability and sustainability. The components of the system must operate together efficiently; yet many of the relationships and interactions are not clearly understood. Appreciation of these matters and how they are affected by external influences or inputs are important for decision making and for achieving desirable outcomes for the farm as a whole. This book analyses common rain-fed farming systems and defines the principles and practices important to their effective functioning and management.

Plant science is one of the fundamental subjects to begin with. Biotechnology has given it a force to get modified into an applied field known as plant biotechnology. Plant tissue culture is widely used for direct commercial applications. Metabolic engineering of plants promises to create new opportunities in agriculture, environmental applications, production of chemicals and even medicine. Therefore, molecular techniques encompassing the use of plants are being focused in this era. The main aim of this book is to provide readers about the applied aspects of plant biotechnology.