Abiotic stress tolerance in wheat (Triticum aestivum L.): Molecular breeding perspectives

Abiotic stresses, such as drought, temperature, salt, and metal stresses, cause a substantial decline in wheat growth and productivity. Various efforts to mitigate abiotic stresses through breeding resilient wheat varieties are ongoing across the globe. Progress is, however, impeded because abiotic stresses are regulated by several genes/quantitative trait loci (QTLs), and they are also affected by environmental conditions. Molecular breeding assisted by various genomic approaches could overcome this and facilitates the rapid development of stress-resistant wheat varieties. This chapter summarizes the identified genomic regions/QTLs associated with abiotic stresses (drought, heat and salinity stress) in wheat. We also discussed how molecular breeding expedites the wheat improvement programs. Recent advances in wheat SNP-array development and speed breeding approaches are also highlighted as options to assist wheat molecular breeding programs. The future outlook of further integrating these technologies and approaches for the development of stress-resilient wheat genotypes is also provided.