Heterosis breeding and hybrid rice; Male sterility systems in rice; Organization of hybrid rice breeding program using CMS system; Source nursery; CMS maintenance and evaluation nursery; Testcross nursery; Restorer purification nursery; Backcross nursery; Combining ability nursery; Breeding rice hybrids with TGMS system; Nucleus and breeder seed production of A, B, R, and TGMS lines; Seed production of experimental rice hybrids; Evaluation of experimental rice hybrids; Improvement of parental lines; Methods of enhancing the levels of heterosis; Quality assurance procedures in hybrid rice breeding.

This symposium is a follow-up to one held in China in 1986. Since then considerable progress has been made in research and development of hybrid rice. This second international symposium was held under the umbrella of the International Rice Research Conference. Eighty scientists and seed production experts from 18 countries, IRRI and FAO attended. Contributions covered breeding, biotechnology, seed production, agronomy, plant physiology, plant pathology, entomology and economics.

This book is open access under a CC BY 4.0 license. By 2050, human population is expected to reach 9.7 billion. The demand for increased food production needs to be met from ever reducing resources of land, water and other environmental constraints. Rice remains the staple food source for a majority of the global populations, but especially in Asia where ninety percent of rice is grown and consumed. Climate change continues to impose abiotic and biotic stresses that curtail rice quality and yields. Researchers have been challenged to provide innovative solutions to maintain, or even increase, rice production. Amongst them, the ‘green super rice’ breeding strategy has been successful for leading the development and release of multiple abiotic and biotic stress tolerant rice varieties. Recent advances in plant molecular biology and biotechnologies have led to the identification of stress responsive genes and signaling pathways, which open up new paradigms to augment rice productivity. Accordingly, transcription factors, protein kinases and enzymes for generating protective metabolites and proteins all contribute to an intricate network of events that guard and maintain cellular integrity. In addition, various quantitative trait loci associated with elevated stress tolerance have been cloned, resulting in the detection of novel genes for biotic and abiotic stress resistance. Mechanistic understanding of the genetic basis of traits, such as N and P use, is allowing rice researchers to engineer nutrient-efficient rice varieties, which would result in higher yields with lower inputs. Likewise, the research in micronutrients biosynthesis opens doors to genetic engineering of metabolic pathways to enhance micronutrients production. With third generation sequencing techniques on the horizon, exciting progress can be expected to vastly improve molecular markers for gene-trait associations forecast with increasing accuracy. This book emphasizes on the areas of rice science that attempt to overcome the foremost limitations in rice production. Our intention is to highlight research advances in the fields of physiology, molecular breeding and genetics, with a special focus on increasing productivity, improving biotic and abiotic stress tolerance and nutritional quality of rice.

This paper provides guidelines for new high-throughput screening methods – both phenotypic and genotypic – to enable the detection of rare mutant traits, and reviews techniques for increasing the efficiency of crop mutation breeding.

Agricultural Biotechnology in China: Origins and Prospects is a comprehensive examination of how the origins of biotechnology research agendas, along with the effectiveness of the seed delivery system and biosafety oversight, help to explain current patterns of crop development and adoption in China. Based on firsthand insights from China’s laboratories and farms, Valerie Karplus and Dr. Xing Wang Deng explore the implications of China’s investment for the nation’s rural development, environmental footprint, as well as its global scientific and economic competitiveness.

“Recent Advances in Rice Research” is an interdisciplinary book dealing with diverse topics related to recent developments in rice research. The book discusses the latest research activities in the field of hybrid rice, various metabolites produced in rice and its biology, stress studies, and strategies to combat various biotic and abiotic stresses as well as rice economics, value addition, and product development. The book is written by an international team of researchers from all over the globe sharing their results in the field of rice research. I am hopeful that the scientific information available in this book will provide advanced knowledge for rice researchers, students, life scientists, and interested readers on some of the latest developments in rice research.